


Amateur Cartography

by fictionalaspect



Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco
Genre: Accidental Relationship, BDSM, Biting, Blindfolds, Bondage, Gags, Humiliation (Mild), M/M, Orgasm Denial, Painplay, Spanking, Waxplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-29
Updated: 2010-11-29
Packaged: 2017-10-13 10:52:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 42,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/136519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictionalaspect/pseuds/fictionalaspect
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the summer of 2008, Brendon’s still trying to figure everything out. He’s good at keeping his own secrets, but when a prank goes awry, he’s faced with the realization that Spencer has some secrets of his own. They end up stumbling backwards into a complicated relationship—one that definitely <i>doesn’t</i> include sex. Or does it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please pay attention to the warnings. More detailed notes can be found [here](http://fictionalaspect.livejournal.com/175844.html).

It's approximately six thousand degrees out.

They're somewhere in Missouri, and it's sometime in June. They've been on the road for close to two months, and Brendon can't really pin anything down with certainty. He squints, through his sunglasses, at the parking lot.

"Hey," Ryan says, from somewhere next to him. Brendon jumps, and then turns to look. Ryan and Jon have collected lawn chairs from somewhere, and are sitting in the tiny triangle of shade created by the juxtaposition of their tour bus with the one next to it. They both have beers in their hands, and neither of them are wearing shoes.

Jon, Brendon realizes, is starting to rub off on Ryan. He's not sure how he feels about that yet, but so far all signs point to positive.

"Hey," Brendon says, tripping easily down the steps. "Room for one more?"

Jon tilts his beer towards TAI's bus. "Ask Mike," Jon says. "They're his lawn chairs. Where's Spencer?"

"Jerking off," Brendon says easily. Jon grins a little around the mouth of beer, and Ryan makes a distressed noise.

"Dude," Ryan says. "Dude, you did _not_ have to say that. I don't want to know, man."

Brendon shrugs. "He might not be," Brendon says. "But based on circumstantial evidence, I figured that was the obvious conclusion."

"What circumstantial evidence?" Ryan says, frowning. "Wait—don't tell me, I take that back."

"He borrowed my computer," Brendon says, squatting down next to them in the shade. Jon's got another beer tucked between his side and the thin canvas of the fold-out camping chair, and Brendon wriggles his hand around until he can pull it out.

"I see," Ryan says, after a long pause. He looks mildly ill.

"He's totally jerking off," Jon agrees. "You should go see if there's another lawn chair."

"That's the plan," Brendon says. "Hey, I wonder—dude, is there any way to see what he watched?"

"Why the fuck would you want to do that?" Ryan says, clearly horrified. "Why would you—oh god."

"Dude," Jon says, clearly delighted at the prospect. "Bden. That's _evil_. You think we could?"

Brendon just smiles a little. He's perfecting his "mysterious and worldly" expression, and now seems as good a time as any to try it out. "Where there's a will," Brendon says, and he and Jon grin at each other while Ryan groans into his beer.

—

So, yeah. Brendon has a lot of porn on his computer.

Whatever. He'd stopped feeling guilty about it about four days after he bought his first laptop. He's spent the best years of his life pornless. Brendon is not ashamed to be making up for lost time.

(The one time he tried to raid his father's closet in search of exciting contraband, Brendon found a stack of pamphlets labeled "How to Keep the Fire Alive In Your Marriage." There were no pictures. It sucked.)

It's all in a big folder labeled that used to be labeled simply PORN—right on his desktop—but Ryan stole his computer at one point and changed the name to EXPLICIT PORNOGRAPHY because Ryan's kind of a strange dude.

So it wasn't weird when Spencer asked to borrow his computer. Brendon made the required tube socks and lotion joke; Spencer told him he was a pervert and that he just needed to check his email. Brendon helpfully double-clicked on the EXPLICIT PORNOGRAPHY folder before handing it off—just to be polite—and then ducked the shoe that Spencer tossed at his head on his way out the door.

And then he went and told Ryan and Jon, because Brendon may be a nice, porn-sharing kind of guy, but he's not a _saint_.

—

"Have you figured it out yet?" Jon stage-whispers, poking his head through Brendon's bed curtain. Brendon's on his stomach, his laptop propped up on a stack of magazines so it won't overheat.

"No," Brendon whispers back. "It's hard, okay? It's actually really complicated." He has six how-to webpages open, and something called his Windows registry, and mostly he's trying to figure out how to do this without breaking his computer.

"That's what he said," Jon says solemnly. "Promise you'll tell me when you figure it out. I bet it's gangbangs."

"I—what?" Brendon says. "You think Spencer is into gangbangs? Why?"

"Ryan is into facials," Jon says.

"Ew," Brendon says, ignoring the slight twist in his gut. "What the hell, how do you know that?"

"Ryan hasn't figured out how to clear his browser history," Jon says. "I checked my email one time after he borrowed my laptop. It was enlightening."

"You know," Brendon says. "There was a time when I thought you were a nice guy. And not, like. The creepiest person I've ever met."

"Wisdom and experience, young grasshopper," Jon says, and taps his nose. "I've been on tour since you were in high school. Knowledge is power."

"I think you mean 'blackmail,'" Brendon says. "But I promise, I'll tell you all about Spencer's kinky secrets. As soon as I figure them out."

"Awesome," Jon says, and pulls Brendon's curtain shut. Brendon shakes his head a little, and goes back to reading. This is some serious Internet hacking shit he's trying to pull, and he doesn't want to fuck it up.

That's like, _way_ too much porn to replace.

—

Brendon nearly ruins his cover, if he's honest with himself. It's almost three am by the time he figures it out, and he's so proud of himself that he gives himself an involuntary fist-pump, right into the ceiling of his bunk. Ryan mumbles something angrily at him, half-awake, and Brendon winces. He's been typing and clicking very, very quietly. The success of this entire operation hinges on secrecy.

Brendon waits a few moments, counts the soft exhalations of his sleeping bandmates, and then double clicks on the program he's (finally, hopefully) configured correctly. He's not thinking very hard about why he's so invested in Spencer's porn habits. Somewhere along the way, this had gone from being a joke to a _mission_ , and once that happened it was victory or bust.

Brendon fist-pumps again—silently this time—when his screen fills up with local folder addresses and running processes. It takes him a while to scroll through everything. There's a lot of background noise, and Brendon has to keep resetting the parameters until it's a manageable amount of data.

Except.

The folder Spencer had been working in was a hidden one, tucked away in layers of subfolders and only accessible by name-search. It's so hidden that occasionally Brendon has trouble finding it himself. He'd only kept it that way because he'd figured early on that if he had to go through all that trouble to find it, no one else ever would.

Apparently he'd been wrong about that.

Unlike the EXPLICIT PORNOGRAPHY folder, this one was haphazardly organized, a random jumble of pictures and videos and even a few text docs. Brendon knew without looking what was in there, but he opened it again, just in case.

There was no preview image on the folder icon, but the first file really said it all. It was a close-up, black and white photograph. Someone's hands were tied behind their back. The shot was slightly unfocused except in the middle, where thick stripes stood out in sharp relief against their skin. The back of the person—Brendon still hadn't been able to figure out if they were male or female, or maybe even neither—was arched, presenting to the camera. Their fingers were clenched loosely.

Brendon had lost count of the number of times he'd jerked off to it.

"Oh," Brendon says, quietly. "Huh." His cheeks feel red, all of a sudden, and Brendon knows it's not from the heat. His stomach feels weird and fluttery. He's breathing way too fast.

 _Well_ , Brendon thinks, in the corner of his mind that's not currently flipping its shit. _This is unexpected._

—

It's super fucking unexpected, is what it is. It's so damn unexpected that it takes Brendon like six days just to process this new information without getting super weird around Spencer. Brendon just has so many questions, all of them sitting on the tip of his tongue, and if he's not careful they're going to fall out at a really inopportune time. Like how Brendon wants to know if that was the first time, and how the hell Spencer even _found_ that folder, and what Spencer likes and what Spencer doesn't like and does he want someone to hold him down, or does he want to be the one doing the holding, and at that point it just devolves into Brendon being creepy.

"You're staring at me," Spencer says, slurping the milk from his cereal bowl. His hair is sticking up in two alternating tufts, like tiny devil horns. "Stop it."

"Am not," Brendon says, even though he is. He wills himself not to blush.

"It's the—" Ryan mumbles, and gestures above his head. He tries to imitate Spencer's ridiculous devil horns, but he can't quite make it work. He settles on bunny ears, and kind of waves them around evilly.

"The fuck are you doing?" Spencer says.

"Looking like you," Ryan says.

"Your hair," Brendon says. He tries a different tack, and mimes alien antennae with both hands. "It's sort of. Epic."

"Seriously," Spencer says, staring at both of them. "Have both of you gone insane?"

"Says the man with the devil horns," Ryan says. He waves his rabbit ears at Spencer for emphasis.

—

"So," Brendon says, three days later. Spencer's sitting in the back lounge, playing Halo. Or rather, Spencer is _lounging_. Brendon has to stop for a minute and wonder how he never realized Spencer had gotten so _long._

"Sup?" Spencer says. He's mashing buttons in a bored, distracted sort of way, like he would rather be doing anything else. Brendon can relate. They're nine hours into a twelve-hour drive and Brendon's skin is starting to feel too tight.

"Uh," Brendon says. "Um. Nothing."

"You want to sit?" Spencer says, and sort of slides over to make room for Brendon. It's a very slinky motion. Spencer Smith was definitely not always this slinky.

"What?" Brendon says. "Oh. I."

"Sit," Spencer says, and it's a definite command this time. His tone is firm. He raises an eyebrow at Brendon, like he can't figure him out but he's willing to try. Brendon's brain does a very low-key sort of _kap-pow-zing!_ Because that was sexy, but it was also a certain _kind_ of sexy, and.

Oh.

"I need to go lie down," Brendon says, backing away slowly. He knows he's blinking too much, that his eyes are probably far too wide. "I just remembered."

"Right," Spencer says, quirking the raised eyebrow. "Happens to me all the time. Brendon, that doesn't even make _sense_."

"Yes it does," Brendon says. "I was tired before, and then I forget, and now I'm tired again. Yes. Goodbye," Brendon says, and scurries off to his bunk to hide and freak out for a little while.

—

"Did you ever figure it out?" Jon whispers to him, when they're sitting side-stage watching the openers. "I'm fucking dying here, B. There's a whole world of Spencer's emotional pain to be enjoyed."

"Nah," Brendon lies. "Sorry dude. Run-of-the-mill type stuff. Nothing to write home about. Girls, boobs. That kind of thing."

"Aw," Jon says. "Shucks."

-

Brendon isn't avoiding Spencer, exactly. Avoiding implies actual lack of physical space-sharing, which is impossible on a tour bus. Brendon is 100% a-okay with being around Spencer, as long as Ryan or Jon is around. For better or for worse, Brendon has zero desire to blurt out "Hey, Spence, how do you feel about caning?" when Ryan Ross is in the room.

He's having a good run, but Brendon knows that sooner or later it's going to break. Spencer isn't stupid, and there are only so many excuses (sore throat, exhaustion, communicable disease, demonic possession) Brendon can come up with.

—

Brendon's napping on the couch in the green room of some venue in some assorted mid-western state when his luck runs out. He slowly becomes aware of something standing very close to him, and the strange sensation of something cold perspiring into the air near his right hand.

"Brendon," Spencer says. "Bden. Wake up. This is for you."

"Hnnngh?" Brendon says. He opens his eyes and blinks and yeah, hey, there's a really large and very cold ICEE next to his hand. It smells like fake-cherry flavour. His mouth waters. Brendon reaches out a clumsy hand for it and Spencer tugs it back slightly.

"Nu-uh," Spencer says. "Not until you tell me why you're avoiding me."

"I'm not avoiding," Brendon mumbles. "You're here, and I'm here. No avoiding up in this piece."

"Seriously," Spencer says. "I'm going to drink this myself if you don't man up and tell me. You know I will. Stop being a lame-ass."

"I'm not," Brendon says. He slants his eyes towards Spencer. His mouth is dry, and his stomach is starting to twist up in knots, a strange sensation when he's barely awake. Ryan and Jon are like, ten feet away. Brendon can't do this.

Spencer wiggles the ICEE.

"I can't," Brendon says, slightly regretful. "It's—It's not a big deal, I promise. But I can't. Not here."

"Okay," Spencer says, and backs away. Brendon frowns.

"I should still get the slushie," Brendon says. "I—hey. Wait."

"Follow the frozen goodness," Spencer says, and backs away towards the door of the green room. "It's starting to melt, you know."

"Are you fucking—fuck," Brendon says, and sits up. He scrubs a hand over his face and then blearily gets up to follow Spencer. Spencer takes two rights and a left, and then they're in an empty hallway. Brendon suddenly doesn't know what to do with his hands.

"Spill," Spencer says, firmly. "Out with it. I'm not buying you another slushie. You have until this one melts, and that's it."

"Uh," Brendon says. He's still a little disoriented. He opens his mouth, and everything starts to come out wrong.

"It's—look," Brendon says. "Jon said you liked gangbangs."

"What?" Spencer says.

"He had this plan—okay, alright, _we_ had this plan. We were going to track the stuff you did on my computer and then fuck with you."

"I really don't like gangbangs," Spencer says. He takes an absent-minded sip of the drink. _Brendon's_ drink. "Why would he think that?"

"I don't know," Brendon says. "I knew you didn't like gangbangs."

"Yes," Spencer says patiently.

"Okay," Brendon says. "So that part happened, and—"

"You're avoiding me...because I don't like gangbangs?" Spencer guesses. He's smirking, just a tiny bit, where he can't seem to keep a straight face.

"Okay, you know what, nevermind," Brendon says. "Give me the damn slushie thing. I'm done."

"Hey," Spencer says. "I'm listening, okay? You're just not making any sense." He hands the slushie over without complaint, though, when Brendon holds out a hand. Brendon sucks on the straw gratefully. The cold liquid helps to clear his head a little bit. He sighs.

"I found what you saw," Brendon says quickly, before he can change his mind. "We had this whole plan, and I tracked the porn you looked up on my computer and it was just. Sorry I'm being weird."

"Oh," Spencer says. He sort of looks at the wall behind Brendon, and Brendon can see him visibly unfocus for a moment, and then snap back into their conversation. "Wow," Spencer says, eventually. "Okay."

"I'm not trying to be weird," Brendon says, truthful, ready to over-share to the end once he gets going. "I don't think it's weird, okay, this is actually one of those situations in which it's not you, it's me."

"Then why?" Spencer says, quieter. "If that's true, then I don't get it. What's your deal?"

"Spence," Brendon says, equally softly. He's hyper aware that they're still in public, that someone could walk through and hear them at any time. "I didn't mean for you to see that stuff. It's not really—public. Like the rest of it."

"I wondered," Spencer says, after a long pause. "About that."

"Yeah," Brendon says. He can feel the steady flush on his cheeks and god, this is even worse than he imagined. "So. I just freaked out, okay? That's it. It's over. I'll be good from now on."

Brendon turns to walk away, but he doesn't get more than a few feet before Spencer's calling out to him.  
"Brendon," Spencer says, still quiet. "You know that's...okay, right? I mean. It doesn't mean you're screwed up, or I'm screwed up, or—"

"Soundcheck's in ten," Brendon says, pretending not to hear him. "I need to warm up."

"Brendon," Spencer says. "Stop it. Don't be a dick."

"Remember when I said this was about me, and not you?" Brendon says. His skin feels itchy, his muscles tensing with a strange sort of unfocused fear. He's aware of how fucking ironic this is, that all he's wanted for weeks is to talk to Spencer, and now that Spencer wants to talk, Brendon's running away. But Brendon just—he can't do this. He's got a show to put on. He can't handle this conversation right now. "This is me not wanting to talk about this right now," Brendon says. "Just so you know."

"Yeah," Spencer says. "I'm getting that."

"Good," Brendon says, and goes to find a bathroom to warm up in.

-

Jon's singing in the shower when Brendon gets the first email. It's kind of a weird background soundtrack to a theoretically life-changing moment, so Brendon turns up the TV until he can't hear Jon's heartfelt rendition of "Drive My Car." It's from an email address Brendon's never seen before, but there are very few people who would take wheatthinskickass@hotmail.com off the market.

 _some stuff for you,_ the email says. _sorry if this is weird. Seemed easier than talking about it._ -ss

There's three images attached to the email. Brendon opens them up each in turn, and then he starts laughing, overwhelmed and slightly hysterical.

"What's up?" Jon rumbles, wandering out of the bathroom, and Brendon slams his laptop shut. He can't seem to stop laughing.

"Nothing," Brendon says. "It's—nothing. It's not that funny." It's 2:41 in the morning, and for some reason it is absolutely hysterical to Brendon that Spencer sent him a picture of a gay couple, a straight couple, and a lesbian couple. It's like Spencer is attempting to be not creepy in the creepiest possible way. It's like he's trying not to offend Brendon with his BDSM latex bondage porn by making a mistake about Brendon's porn-viewing preferences.

It's the idea that Spencer's seen everything in Brendon's private kinky fantasy folder and he's still worried about weirding out _Brendon._

 _I have no idea how to react to this_ , Brendon thinks. He keeps snickering for another few minutes. Jon frowns at him, concerned, the whole time.

-

Sixteen hours later, Brendon is feeling a little more sane. Actual sleep, on a bed that isn't moving and doesn't smell like old socks, seems to do that to a person.

He hits "reply" and leaves the message part blank. Brendon attaches at random, barely even looking at the thumbnails. Spencer's more than likely seen it all.

 _It's not weird,_ Brendon types, before he hits "send." _I'm good._

It's a lie. It's incredibly fucking weird, but it _shouldn't_ be, is the thing. This is no different than sending Pete horrible furry porn or finding a new Jenna Haze video and ripping it for Jon. This is just two dudes sharing porn, and maybe some of it is a little unusual, but it doesn't mean anything.

Brendon might _want_ it to mean something, deep down inside, but it doesn't.

-

"Hey," Spencer says, the morning after. He's standing in the lobby. He looks weirdly cheerful for 6am.

"Hey," Brendon says. He yawns, and rubs at the bridge of his nose with his first and middle fingers. He's not particularly awake yet. His legs still feel all rubbery.

"Here," Spencer says, and pushes his coffee cup into Brendon's hand. "I got this one for you."

"Okay," Brendon says. He takes a tentative sip, and then he practically curls his whole body around the recycled paper cup. "This," Brendon says in confusion. "This is not hotel coffee. This is good coffee. Where. Where did the good coffee come from."

"I was up early," Spencer says, stretching his arms up behind his head. "Today's gonna be a good day."

"Why?" Brendon says. "Besides the coffee."

"No reason," Spencer says, and half-smiles at him. It's a conspiratorial smile. Brendon blinks. _Kinky porn = morning coffee_ , his brain supplies helpfully. _Wait, no._

"I'm so confused," Brendon says, out loud.

"So was I," Spencer says. "But not so much, any more."

"No," Brendon says, after a long pause. "No, now I'm more confused."

"So am I," Ryan says, materializing at his elbow and stealing a sip. "Where the fuck did you get the good coffee?"

-

Spencer lets it go, for a while.

Brendon is grateful.

-

"So," Spencer says, as they're walking from the bus to a meet-and-greet. "Why don't you want to talk about it?"

"Uh," Brendon says. He shakes his head a little, like there's something wrong with his ears, but no, Spencer really did just say that. He glances over to see Jon and Ryan and Zack trailing them across the parking lot. They have approximately forty-five seconds in which to conclude this conversation.

Brendon looks back at Spencer, and he's smiling a little at Brendon. He raises one eyebrow, and Brendon is suddenly completely certain he's done this on purpose.

"Fine," Brendon says, shaking his head a little. He can feel a small smile starting to grow on his lips. Spencer is totally a calculating bastard. "I just—I don't know, dude. I really don't. There's not much to talk about."

"How so?" Spencer says. The fence is getting closer. Through the chain-link, Brendon can see a slowly pulsating mass of people, milling around endlessly.

"It's not like I've done it," Brendon says. "I—any of it. There isn't much to tell. I just think it's hot. And it's easier, I guess." The anticipated briefness of their conversation makes him bold. Someone yells out his name, and Brendon waves a little. "Talking online, I mean. It's just. Easier. For me."

"Hmm," Spencer says, before they're in earshot of the fans and they have to make a rapid subject-change. "Huh."

-

Emailing Spencer is one of the weirder things Brendon's ever done, for sure. Spencer will email him on the bus from ten feet away, and Brendon will reply, and neither of them will make eye contact until their laptops are safely closed. Brendon feels like he's the star of a really strange spy movie.

Half the time it isn't even about porn, or sex, or whatever. They tend to get off topic via the written word just as fast as they get off topic when they're talking, so half the time it ends up being a conversation about how Ryan is seriously the loudest fucking chewer on earth, with a dirty picture attached.

 _he's done it since we were kids,_ Spencer replies a few minutes later. _I used to hide all the popcorn under the couch when he got up to piss, because otherwise I wouldn't be able to hear the damn movie over the sound of his crunching._

_anyway what do you think about paddles? i've got a set that I just found, but it's a little intense. the guy cries. you want it?_

_yeah,_ Brendon types back. _please._

It doesn't take long for the zip file to download. Spencer's labelled it "Handy Household Tips! xo Mom" and Brendon bursts out laughing. Jon gives him a weird look, and then shrugs.

 _I really hope your mom didn't send you that,_ Brendon writes back. _do we need to have a talk about boundaries?_

 _I don't know, do we?_ Spencer sends back.

Brendon swallows a little. He wants to look up and ask Spencer if that sentence means what he thinks it means, but. It's really not an option. Brendon has the strongest sensation of being watched, but when he looks up Spencer's talking to Ryan about a problem with his kit.

 _no blood,_ Brendon writes back, eventually. _no permanent injuries. no foot fetish stuff because it's weird. no enemas. no pissing on people. the usual stuff._ Brendon tries to think if he's covered everything. It's all theoretical, anyway. Brendon's tied people up, the sort of vanilla bondage-lite that everyone tries when they're seventeen. Brendon has had slightly rough, out-of-control sex, and he's had girls scratch the hell out of his back, but he's always been the one pushing it forward. The idea of _not_ being in control, of setting his limits and leaving the playing field open, makes his breath suddenly shallow.

"Guys," Jon says, out of the blue. "Guys. They're making a new Star Wars movie."

"What?" Ryan says. "They already made those. I don't believe you."

"I swear to god," Jon says. "For real. Look right here, it says—" Jon pushes the newspaper over towards Ryan's face, and just as Ryan leans in, he pulls it away to reveal his hand in the A-ok sign.

"Oh my god, fuck you," Ryan says. "That was _low."_

"I win the game!" Jon crows, and punches Ryan in the shoulder. Ryan rubs the bruise, pouting a little.

Brendon presses send.

-

Spencer has always had a weird habit of buying presents for people, of scattering little gifts like rain. He sees something that reminds him of someone, and he buys it, even if that person is ten feet away.

During those first two weeks of emails, Brendon finds a postcard with a picture of kittens crammed into a sneaker; an extra-large bag of Swedish fish; a Maryland magnet with a giant crab wearing a crab bib; and a trashy romance novel called _Love Hurts._ Spencer usually just tosses them on his bunk and closes the curtain, but the romance novel is sitting on his pillow.

With a chocolate.

"Suck my dick," Brendon yells gleefully, and throws the book at Spencer. Spencer ducks, laughing, using his pillow as a shield.

-

The party is in someone's suite. Someone Brendon doesn't really know, but it's a tour and everyone's there, because at this point they're all essentially first cousins. Touring makes family out of strangers. A really drunk, dysfunctional family.

Brendon gets high with Jon, and then he ends up babysitting Ryan for a while, because Ryan is drunker than he is and also attempting to dance. Brendon doesn't interfere with Ryan's attempts to make friends; he's just trying to make sure Ryan doesn't fall off the balcony. It's not that Brendon doesn't like dancing, but he does it on stage more than the rest of them. His calves are sore.

The night winds its way towards dawn. People show up; People leave in twos and threes and mores. Brendon eats the crappy room-service food that shows up. He drinks more.

"Okay," Brendon says, somewhere on the wrong side of three AM. He's pressed up against Spencer on the tiny-love seat in the foyer of the suite. Someone puts on George Michael, and all the dancers throw their hands up in drunken glee. "Like, okay, okay, sorry dude, I know I'm drunk, but I have to know."

"Wha?" Spencer says. He scratches at his beard.

"You've done it before," Brendon says, and it's not a question. Spencer blinks at him.

"Just tell me who," Brendon says, because he's dying to know, absolutely fucking dying over here. "I'm so fucking curious, dude."

"Oh, that." Spencer says, and shrugs. "Tom," Spencer says, like it's no big deal.

"Tom?" Brendon hisses, far-too-loud. "Tom _Conrad?_ You fucked—"

"Oh my god Brendon _shut up_ ," Spencer says, clapping his hand over Brendon's mouth. Brendon breathes out through his nose. He makes a wounded face at Spencer.

"You have to be quiet," Spencer says, leaning in so he's pretty much just whispering in Brendon's ear and oh, hey. Brendon feels a slight shiver run down his spine. Spencer's voice sounds lazy, thick and relaxed even as he's admonishing Brendon to not be a total drunken spazz.

"Are you going to be quiet?" Spencer whispers, and Brendon nods carefully. "Okay," Spencer says, and takes his hand away.

"I can't believe you fucked Tom Conrad," Brendon says.

"I didn't fuck him," Spencer says. "I never said that."

"You did," Brendon says. "Are you—there's no way I'm that drunk. I heard you."

"I meant we'd—you know," Spencer says, and makes this weird little hand-movement that manages to encompass lots of vaguely sexual acts without actually picking one. "Stuff. It wasn't. Uh. Sexual."

"Like hell it wasn't sexual," Brendon says. "Have you ever actually seen Tom Conrad?"

"You're totally missing the point," Spencer says. "Look. It wasn't a big deal. We just, you know. On the first tour."

"Tom _Conrad_ ," Brendon says, leaning back against the couch cushions. "That is. He is the _last_ person I was expecting you to say. Who the hell would let Tom tie them up? That's a recipe for disaster."

"Tom doesn't like to tie people up," Spencer says, leaning back so they're still pressed together on the couch. It's easier to whisper this way, to make it look like they're just—well. Being Panic! at the Disco, basically. Ryan has a whispering thing, and so does Jon. They whisper a lot, like nervous children caught with their hands in the cookie jar.

"Oh," Brendon says. There's a pause of about a minute, give or take, and then Brendon goes " _Oh."_

"Yeah," Spencer says. "You're kinda drunk, aren't you."

"A little," Brendon says. "Okay. That makes _way_ more sense."

"Yup," Spencer says.

"So, what, you went up to Tom and were like, hey, you look like you're into some kinky shit! I'm into some kinky shit! Let's do kinky things together while we're on tour?" Brendon says. He takes a long drag of his beer, and if he misses his mouth slightly the first time around, no one can prove a thing.

"Basically," Spencer says. Brendon sputters, and Spencer loses it, cracking up and also patting Brendon on the back so he doesn't choke. "I'm _kidding_ , _"_ Spencer says. "Look, I don't know, Brendon, honestly. It just kind of happened."

Brendon nods, still trying to catch his breath. Spencer's hand is still on his back, spread in between his shoulder blades. Spencer waits a beat and then starts rubbing a little, small circular motions that seem unconscious. Brendon wants to fold back into the petting, because he's drunk and it feels nice, but there's something holding him back.

"So you guys didn't have sex," Brendon says, taking care to modulate his voice so Spencer isn't forced to essentially gag him in public again. "But it was still good?"

Spencer gives him another one of those looks—questioning, unreadable. "It's always good," Spencer says. "It's not always about sex, Brendon. But I think you know that."

"Mmm," Brendon says. He takes another sip of his beer, and then tips his head onto Spencer's shoulder. Spencer's arm is around his lower back, slipping lower as they both get lazier, and he curls it around Brendon's hip.

"I'm not an expert," Spencer says, suddenly. "You know that, right? I don't want you to think I'm some guru or some shit."

"I don't," Brendon says. Spencer smells really good. Spencer always smells good, but Brendon tends to notice it more when he's drunk.

"Okay," Spencer says. He squeezes Brendon's hip.

-

 _Why do you like it?_ Brendon types, when it's four am and he can't sleep.

 _I don't know,_ Spencer sends, the next morning. _It just works for me, I guess. I like being the one calling the shots._

-

Brendon has a milkshake, and today is awesome. The sun is shining and they're in downtown Portland and Brendon is swinging a shopping bag from his hand that contains two new Xbox games, three DVDs, a new pair of dumb sunglasses, two books he's been meaning to read, and a slightly embarrassing amount of penny candy.

"I was thinking," Brendon says, heedless and rolling on his shopping high. "You know, when we get back to Cali. Or Vegas. Maybe I could—find someone."

"Oh," Spencer says. "Uh."

"Really on the DL," Brendon says. "I mean, shit. That can't get out."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Spencer says, very carefully, like he's weighing each word as it comes out.

"Not really," Brendon admits. "But I just—dude, it itches. Under my skin. I have to know."

"Maybe you should get that checked out," Spencer says, and Brendon laughs. Spencer grins at him, warm and familiar even though his eyes are hidden behind large black shades.

"I was thinking the exact opposite, actually," Spencer says, three blocks later. "I thought. Maybe you and me?"

The back of Brendon's neck feels hot, and it's not just from the sunlight beating down on them.

"Oh," Brendon breathes out, a shaky sort of noise. Spencer completely misinterprets it.

"I—okay," Spencer says. "Forget I said that. You probably want a girl, right? You want a girl. I'm dumb. Sorry."

Brendon stops on the sidewalk. His milkshake sloshes around inside the paper cup. This is the moment of fucking reckoning, right here. He takes a deep breath. "I would," Brendon says. "I would really like that but that's a terrible fucking idea."

"Because I'm...me?" Spencer guesses. "A dude?"

"Because we're in a band, dumbass," Brendon says. He starts walking again, because they're starting to hold up pedestrian traffic.

"We're not—it wouldn't be permanent," Spencer mumbles, and then winces when Brendon raises an eyebrow. "Look, Brendon. People get really hurt that way. You could just try some stuff out with me, you know. I don't mind."

"Ummmm," Brendon says, and tries to ignore the way his heart is racing. "Like, okay, putting aside all the other shit—"

"And dude, this way you won't have to worry about it getting out—"

"I haven't," Brendon says. "With a guy. Ever."

"Really?" Spencer says.

"Not for lack of trying," Brendon admits. "Or like. Trying in my head and not actually trying in real life."

"I was thinking we wouldn't," Spencer says. "Uh, for the band? We'll—We'll keep our clothes on. Metaphorically speaking."

"So it's just a, uh. Learning experience," Brendon says. "A totally non-sexual learning experience." He swallows. He kind of feels like he's going to pass out, but it's not a bad feeling.

"Will you be freaked out if I send you a checklist?" Spencer says.

-

 _spencer this checklist is terrifying_ , Brendon sends.

 _so don't check them all,_ Spencer sends back. _learning experience, dumbass. that's the point of the checklist._

Brendon tips his head back against the side of his bunk. He kind of wants to explain that it's terrifying in the good way, in that way that made him half-hard just from opening the file. But they're not having sex, so he doesn't.

Brendon checks half of them anyway.

-

"I swear to god," Brendon says, kicking and shuffling his way through the tour bus, using his feet to search through the mess. He's talking to everyone and no one in particular. "I bought twenty-four pairs of socks last week, and half of them are on Ryan, and he only has two feet so I don't even fucking—Ryan Ross! Can you hear me, asshole?" Brendon yells, raising his voice. "Stop growing new feet and give me my socks back."

"He's not here," Spencer calls, from the back lounge. "He's with Jon. They're making friends down in the hospitality tent."

"That's nice," Brendon says, making his way to the back lounge. "I still need socks. Spencer, give me your socks."

"I'm wearing them," Spencer says. "Sorry."

"Right," Brendon says. He had a pithy reply all set up, and now he's lost it, because Spencer's standing in the middle of the back lounge with rope. It's nice rope—thin, black, small coils. It looks soft. Spencer's got it wrapped around the palm of one hand, testing it with a thoughtful expression. He looks up at Brendon.

"Brendon," Spencer says, "Come here."

"Where the hell did you get the rope?" Brendon says.

"Brendon," Spencer says, still perfectly calm. He tugs on it a little, watching the coils tighten up around his palm as he applies force to the wrap. "I said you should come here. I want to try something."

"Now?" Brendon says weakly. "I mean, yes, okay, but what if—"

"It won't take long," Spencer says. He shakes the coils off his hand, gathering the rope up in a neat loop. Brendon swallows. Spencer looks like he knows what he's doing.

Brendon crosses the room.

"Hi," Spencer says, and smiles at him. "I'm going to tie you up now." Then he's turning Brendon around roughly, situating him with both hands behind his back, and Brendon can feel the edge of excitement, of fear, starting to rise in his chest. Both of Brendon's wrists fit in Spencer's large palms. Brendon can feel the sharp, sudden tug of the rope around his wrists, and—-oh. Wow. Hey.

"You're good," Spencer says eventually, slipping a finger in between the ropes to test them. He squeezes Brendon's shoulder, rubbing his thumb into the muscle.

"Cool. See you later," Spencer says, and Brendon can feel his mouth drop open. Seriously, _what the fuck._ Brendon's the first to admit he doesn't know a damn thing about what they're doing, but he's pretty sure it involves a lot more attention. On him.

"Spencer." Brendon glares at him, flapping his hands behind his back, a little uselessly. It's a pretty tight knot. "You're seriously just going to leave me here."

"Yup," Spencer says, entirely unconcerned. "Fifteen minutes, I think."

"To do, what, exactly? I _don't have any hands."_

"Relax," Spencer says, with a small smile. There's an edge to it that's new, that's different, and Brendon pauses. He doesn't know how to explain it, except it makes him feel expansive and very small at the same time. It makes him want to do something to get Spencer's attention, except he already _has_ Spencer's attention. It's confusing.

"You look good like that," Spencer says, eventually. He's giving Brendon a very obvious once-over, like he's re-evaluating him. It sends a strange thrill of heat down Brendon's spine. "Just relax. Try it out. I figure—before we start this for real. We'll just try it out real quick. See how it goes. For you."

Brendon sucks in a breath, and has a sudden urge to break eye contact. It's weird. His head seems to want to turn itself to the side, eyelashes dipping, but he ignores it and stares straight at Spencer. He feels overexposed all of a sudden, whited out like a bad photograph, too bright and too tense. Spencer is still giving him this appraising look, and Brendon settles for flexing his shoulders a little, rolling his neck, lengthening his spine where it's starting to cramp.

"What if I don't want to?" Brendon says. He doesn't know why, but he feels a sudden insatiable need to push, to feel out the boundaries of this. It's stupid, because it's only fifteen minutes. He's done worse to Ryan and Jon in the name of practical jokes, but right now those jokes seem very far away. "What if I was like, Spencer, untie me right the fuck now?"

Spencer thinks about it for a minute, and then he smiles. It's not a particularly nice smile. It's bright, but sharp. "Nope," Spencer says.

"What?" Brendon wasn't aware that no was an option.

"No, I don't think I'm going to untie you."

Brendon can feel his mouth hanging open, just a little.

"What—" Brendon says, and then swallows when Spencer crosses the room swiftly. Spencer leans down, a tiny bit, just so his face is level with Brendon's. He swipes a thumb over the hollow created by Brendon's collarbone, pressing in gently.

"Fifteen minutes," is all he says before dropping his hand and walking away.

Brendon drops his head down and bites his lip. He can hear the sound of the door closing. The lock clicks into place.

"Well, fuck," Brendon whispers, half-terrified and half amazed.

-

Roughly forty-five seconds in, Brendon realizes that there isn't a lot he can do with no hands.

Brendon suspects the point of this whole thing isn't for him to sit around and watch TV, or stare out the window at the parking lot, but he's not sure what else he's _supposed_ to do. Spencer had told him to just relax, but it's hard.

Brendon doesn't want to relax.

He shifts a little bit, feeling the pressure on his wrist bones from the restraint. It's definitely a strong knot. Spencer knows what he's doing. He moves his hands a little more—stretching, testing—but no, he can't actually get his hands free. Short of getting a knife from the kitchen and cutting through the rope somehow. Short of cheating.

He pulls on his wrists again, and his stomach curls a little bit. He shifts his hips. It's like he's suddenly more aware of his own body, now that he can't move certain parts of it. He rolls his shoulders back. He wonders if, when Spencer unties him, his hands will just float free like that game they used to play in middle school. The one where someone presses your hands down really hard and then at the end they just...lift.

Brendon shifts his hips again and realizes he played that game a lot. Probably more than normal.

Brendon checks the clock.

Ten minutes.

—

Four minutes.

 _Huh_ , Brendon thinks, kicking his feet idly, flexing his fingers. _This is kind of relaxing. Weird._

_—_

One minute.

His shoulders are actually starting to hurt now, an ache that's centered in the middle of his back. Maybe hurt isn't the right word, since he's sort of pulling on his hands to make the sensation a little stronger.

Brendon's nibbling at his lip, absentmindedly, and almost before he can think about it he bites down, hard. It sends a frisson of nerve endings all the way down his spine, curling in his stomach and he pushes up into air without thinking. He wonders if it's going to be awkward when Spencer comes back. He's kind of obviously turned on.

His whole body is itchy, awake, even as all of his higher brain functions feel very distant. Brendon has a feeling that if Spencer came back here and told him to make him dinner naked, no hands, Brendon would probably try. That would be kind of hot, actually. If it wasn't completely impossible.

Spencer opens the door and crosses the room quietly, at fifteen minutes on the dot. "Hey," he says.

Brendon opens his eyes and looks up at him. "Hey," he returns, smiling slightly. Spencer's really tall from this angle. Brendon's kind of...floaty. It's not a bad feeling. It's kind of hard to resist rubbing his face against Spencer's thigh.

Spencer slides down onto the floor, so he's facing Brendon, knees up and forearms wrapped around them. "So," Spencer says. "How's things?"

Brendon nods happily. "Good." The movement makes his arms shift and pull again. It feels nice.

"You like it?" Spencer says.

"Yup," Brendon says. He lets out a breath that's not-quite a sigh. It's kind of hard to concentrate like this, but whatever.

Spencer frowns. "Did you smoke up while I was gone? How would you even—" He pauses.

Brendon grins. His legs are starting to tingle now, just a little bit, like a soft echo of pins and needles. He doesn't think it has anything to do with his arms, though. It's just that full body awareness, like he's suddenly discovered he has hips and hands and thighs. It makes him want to crawl over to Spencer, except he's on the couch and Spencer's on the floor and he'll absolutely fall on his face if he tries it with no hands.

"You sure you're okay?" Spencer says. He reaches out, and tugs on Brendon's jaw a little, forcing Brendon to look straight at him.

"Mmmhmm?" Brendon says. He raises his gaze, sleepy-eyed, relaxed. He wonders if he looks any different. Apparently he does, because Spencer's eyes widen almost comically.

"Wow," Spencer says, softly. He looks—pleased, almost. Pleased and amazed, and it makes something happy burn low in Brendon's chest. Then he seems to shake himself out of it a bit, dropping his hand and saying "Okay, so. We'll talk about this later then, I guess."

"Huh?" Brendon's kind of confused. They were totally just having a conversation. Why is Spencer changing the subject? "What? I was listening, dude, I was." Mostly. Brendon's still tingly, and he can't seem to stop flexing his fingers, playing with his wrist.

Spencer reaches out and runs a hand along his shoulders, massaging his neck for a second. Brendon's eyes practically roll back in his head because wow, it feels _really good._ Brendon shifts into the touch as much as he can without overbalancing.

"I'm going to untie you now," Spencer says. "Because we're not actually playing, and I said I would, so I am. Is that okay?"

"Mmm," Brendon says, but it's a slightly sad sort of noise. He doesn't really want Spencer to untie him, but some part of his brain is sparking and telling him that they have to be somewhere soon. Brendon can't do a soundcheck with no hands. That would be bad.

He tries not to whimper as Spencer guides him around and unties his wrists, rubbing at the tendons with the pad of his thumb. Brendon can feel the bones shift slightly. Spencer prods at his hip, trying to get him to turn around and face him and Brendon feels—shy, all of a sudden, like a repeat of when he'd looked at Spencer earlier. He suddenly wants to cut his eyes down and away. To break eye contact.

"Hey," Spencer says, pulling him in. "Hey, come here." Brendon goes willingly, tucking his head into Spencer's shoulder. Spencer pets at him a little, light hands running through his hair. It's nice. It feels good.

Brendon breathes.

"Sorry about that," Spencer says, eventually. Brendon shakes his head a little, and tries to focus. He's not sure what Spencer is apologizing for. His brain is still recompartmentalizing.

"For what?" Brendon says, and if his voice is a little slow, a little distant, neither of them point it out.

"For starting something we can't finish," Spencer says. "I didn't think—you went under really fast."

"Under?" Brendon says. "What?"

"Sometimes that happens," Spencer says. "Don't—I mean, I'm not saying you did anything wrong, you didn't, shit, Brendon." Spencer pulls away and looks at him for a moment, and his expression is strange, almost awed. "That's just. I really didn't expect that to happen right now."

"Oh," Brendon says. He thinks about it for a second. "I still feel kind of weird."

"I know," Spencer says. He's rubbing at the small of Brendon's back. Brendon wants to curve into the touch. He's starting to have a totally-non-sexual-learning-experience crush on Spencer's hands.

"Good weird?" Spencer says. "Or bad weird."

"Good weird," Brendon says. Brendon actually has no idea how to explain what just happened in words that make sense. 'Good weird,' he feels, is about as close as he's getting. He twitches, an involuntary shiver running down his spine. His muscles are still adjusting back to their old space and tension. He's still kind of keyed up, kind of horny, but he doesn't have that lack of impulse control. That sort of mind-in-the-moment obliviousness to everything around him.

"We've got a little while," Spencer says, and reaches out for the remote. "Just sit here with me, okay? We'll watch TV."

"Sure," Brendon says. He settles back into the couch cushions, and Spencer. Spencer pulls him in a little closer, one hand on his hip, around Brendon's back. Brendon tucks his knees up and lets himself sort of melt into Spencer's side.

"So you still want to do this?" Spencer says, when they're twenty-six minutes into Tila Tequila's never ending quest for love. "Because you can say no. You can always say no."

"Yeah," Brendon says. Spencer's t-shirt is warm and soft against his cheek. "Yeah, I really kind of do."

-

Two more weeks in the tour. They're gearing up for the final run, and it's going to be a hell of a time. Brendon spends the next three days running on pent-up energy and caffeine and whatever the hell the caterers bring. They have interview after candid photoshoot after interview after meet-and-greet. They pose for endless pictures. Brendon charms the reporters into submission, and Ryan fascinates them into a good review. It's a system they've worked out early on. They both enjoy the challenge of it, the weird high.

Unlike the rest of their band.

"Should we tell them the toaster's unplugged?" Brendon whispers.

"Nope," Ryan says. He's slurping the milk from his cereal bowl with an expression of intense concentration. They have fifteen minutes before they need to be fed, dressed, and out the door for a radio interview. Ryan and Brendon are already up and dressed. Jon and Spencer are making increasingly horrified noises at the toaster.

"You're really evil," Brendon says. There's a hint of admiration in his voice. "What if they don't have time to eat breakfast?"

"Survival of the fittest," Ryan says placidly. "This is Darwinism in action. If they can't figure it out, they don't deserve breakfast. It's like watching the Discovery channel, only better."

Jon hits the toaster. It doesn't respond. Spencer gives up and goes to get dressed, mumbling angrily about the quality of American home appliances.

"And more violent," Brendon adds.

"No one's been mauled yet," Ryan says. "We're good for now." He sets his cereal bowl down with a clunk.

-

"Hey," Brendon says. "So, I was thinking, tomorrow—"

"Yup," Spencer says. He's slugging back a bottle of water like his life depends on it.

"Wow, that bottle of water had it coming," Brendon says. "So anyway. Tomorrow—"

"Hotel night," Spencer says. "Yup." He finishes the bottle of water, and then chucks it across the room at the trash can. It bounces off the rim, and Ryan points and laughs.

"Yes," Brendon says, after a pause. "Hey, could you maybe do that thing where you don't assume I can always read your mind?"

Spencer grins at him. He leans in so his voice doesn't carry. "You'll stay with me tomorrow," Spencer says. "And we're going to play, and it's going to be awesome. Right?"

"Right," Brendon says, a little weakly. There's something about the way Spencer says 'play' that makes him feel excited and slightly dirty at the same time.

"See? Totally on the same page," Spencer says.

"But we need an excuse," Brendon presses. "Like, why we aren't out with everyone at dinner and stuff."

"Oh," Spencer says. "Hmmm."

"Yeah, hmmm," Brendon whispers back. "See, you're not all knowing."

"Secrets are for lamers!" Jon yells out, across the break room. He's being fitted with a mic for an interview, and the girl setting him up jerks away with a murderous expression.

"Your face is for lamers," Brendon yells back.

"I think I've got an idea," Spencer replies, at normal volume. "Leave this one to me."

"Guys, announcement," Ryan says, clapping his hands. He pauses for dramatic emphasis. "Spencer has an _idea_."

"Yeah," Spencer says. "It was your Mom's. Tell her thanks for that."

"I—what?" Ryan says.

"My idea." Spencer says patiently. "I got it from your mom." He pauses. "When I fucked her."

"I walked right into that, huh," Ryan says ruefully.

"Yep," Spencer says. "You really did."

-

Brendon should not have left the excuses up to Spencer. By the time they're riding over to the hotel, Ryan and Jon are sending him increasingly sympathetic looks, tinged with pity and a fair amount of disgust. Zack pats him on the head and tells him to "Get some rest, little dude. Drink lots of water. Hydration is key."

"What did you fucking tell them?" Brendon hisses in the elevator, after Ryan and Jon and Zack have gotten off. "They're all acting like I've got herpes."

"Everyone has herpes," Spencer says.

"You know what I mean," Brendon says. " _What did you say?"_

"I just implied heavily that you were having some, uh. Private issues." Spencer says. "No big."

"Private issues?" Brendon says. "What the fuck does that mean?"

"The kind that require easy access to a bathroom," Spencer says. "Look, this way you know they won't check up on you."

"Next time _you're_ having the private issue," Brendon says. "Except it won't be private, because I'll tell everyone you have syphilis."

"You do that," Spencer says, grinning. The door lets out a ding! as they arrive on the 14th floor. "Tell me how that works out for you."

"I will," Brendon says. "So help me god, I will." He follows Spencer down the hallway, and into the room. Brendon drops his bag at the foot of his bed and then he realizes that they're actually here, alone, behind a locked door, and he suddenly gets antsy again. He goes in the bathroom and pisses, because he doesn't know what else to do.

"I'm taking a shower," Spencer says when he comes out, entirely unconcerned. He's got his kit in one hand, and he's already half naked. Brendon makes himself nod, and not stare creepily at Spencer. "You good for a while?"

"Yeah," Brendon says, even if he has no idea what Spencer's asking. He doesn't really know what the plan is for tonight, because Spencer wouldn't tell him. Brendon kind of wants to get started as soon as possible, because he's nervous, but. That isn't up to him.

Brendon lies on the bed and listens to the sounds of Spencer moving around in the shower. He thinks about how he's a little horny, but mostly just tired and worn out. Which is probably good, because this isn't about sex. It's about something else that Brendon hasn't quite figured out yet, but he's working on it.

Spencer comes out whistling, toweling his hair like he doesn't have a care in the world. It's weird - the more relaxed Spencer gets, the more Brendon feels on-edge. He wants something to happen, and he wants it to happen _now._

"So, okay," Brendon says, when he can't take it any longer. "Were we still going to—"

"Mmmhmm," Spencer says. He finishes towel-drying his hair, and he drops the wet towel on the floor. He's wearing boxers and a pair of loose jeans, no shirt. Brendon's kind of glad Spencer isn't wearing his pajama pants, the ones with the sheep on them. He's not sure he'd be able to take him seriously.

Spencer crosses the room. When he's standing next to Brendon on the bed, he looms. Brendon looks up at him.

"What's your safeword?" Spencer says.

"Do I need one?" Brendon says.

"Yes," Spencer says. "Absolutely. You haven't thought of one?"

"I've been, ah," Brendon says. "Uh. Kinda busy lately. If you hadn't noticed."

"Busy doesn't matter if you're in the fucking Emergency Room," Spencer says. He shakes his head. "You have to take this seriously, Brendon."

"But you're not going to send me to the emergency room," Brendon says. He swallows. "Right?"

"I wouldn't," Spencer says. "But people could. Someone who doesn't know their shit, yeah."

"Okay," Brendon says. He thinks about it for a minute. "It's supposed to be something not sexy, right?"

"Yeah," Spencer says. "Something you'd never say during sex. Not that we're—yeah. You know what I mean."

Brendon nods. "So, okay. Ryan Ross?"

Spencer's glare intensifies. He stares at Brendon for a long moment. Brendon stares back.

" _No_ ," Spencer says, finally losing it and snickering. "You can't use _Ryan Ross_ as your safeword, what the fuck."

"Just a thought," Brendon says. "Fine. My safeword is, uh—" Brendon looks around the room. "Beige."

"Are you going to remember that?" Spencer says.

"Yup," Brendon says. He's pretty sure he's not going to forget tonight, whatever happens. It's one of those life-changing experiences, and stuff.

"Okay," Spencer says. He rolls his shoulders out, stretching his neck, straightening his back. He looks different when he's done. More present in his body. Brendon thinks about what Spencer's going to do to him, has been _planning_ to do to him, and just like that, he's half hard.

"Ready?" Spencer says.

"Yes," Brendon says. He takes a deep breath, and holds out his wrists.


	2. Chapter 2

"No," Spencer says, immediately, his smile a little crooked. "I'm not tying you up, Brendon."

"I—what?" Brendon says, frowning. He'd been pretty sure that was the whole point of this. One of the points, anyway. "Why not?"

Spencer looks down at him. He smiles wider. "Maybe I want to get you there myself," Spencer says, and then he's got one hand fisted in Brendon's hair. He pulls. "Up, Brendon. Off the bed."

"Ow," Brendon yelps. "Fuck—"

"No," Spencer says. He's way too calm for someone who is currently dragging Brendon over to the wall by his hair. Brendon stumbles over his own feet trying to keep up. "You can say 'yes,' 'no,' 'please,' and 'thank you,' "Spencer says. "Otherwise I don't want you to talk. Understood?"

"Yes," Brendon gasps out. Jesus Christ, that really hurts. "Sir," he adds, belatedly. He doesn't know why, and it makes him feel kind of silly, but some part of him wants to get a rise out of Spencer.

"Good," Spencer says. "Now be quiet. Do you think you can do that for me?"

"Okay," Brendon says. His toes hit the edge of the baseboard. Brendon throws out his hands to break his anticipated fall, but Spencer slows their combined momentum just before impact. He crowds Brendon into the wall, Brendon's back to his front, and links his fingers with Brendon's. He's entirely covering Brendon's body, warm and strong and Spencer-smelling. Brendon can't seem to breathe properly.

"Brendon," Spencer says softly, into his ear. He sounds normal, but there's a hint of steel in his voice that's never been there before. "Didn't I just tell you not to talk?"

Oh.

"Yes," Brendon says. He wants to say, _sorry_ , but Spencer didn't tell him he could say that.

"You don't sound very sorry," Spencer says. "Hmmm."

Brendon swallows. His throat feels dry. "Please?" Brendon tries, because that was on the acceptable list of words, and it's the closest one to what he actually wants to say.

"So polite," Spencer rumbles. He's pressing Brendon's hands into the wallpaper, holding Brendon's wrists in place effortlessly. "I haven't even done anything to you yet." Brendon nods. It's not actually that hard to be polite to Spencer like this, even if Brendon feels kind of weird and dumb. Spencer can be really intimidating when he wants to be. It's a knee-jerk reaction.

Spencer pulls away, so he's not covering Brendon's body quite so closely. "Hands up," he says, and as he does so he stretches Brendon's hands towards the ceiling. There's a wallpaper accent panel running around the top half of the room, roughly seven and a half feet up. Brendon can touch it with his fingertips if he goes up on his toes. Spencer's hands cover his own, pulling him into place.

"Stay," Spencer murmurs, into his ear. "Every time your fingers come off that line, I'm adding five."

 _What?_ Brendon wants to call out. _Five of what?_ He stays silent. It takes all of his concentration to stay like this, half up on his toes, balanced against the wall. He feels Spencer stepping away, the sudden loss of contact. The back of Brendon's neck feels hot. He keeps his face turned to the wall.

Brendon counts sixteen of his own inhalations before Spencer comes back, before he runs his hands up Brendon's side and causes Brendon to jerk in surprise. "I'm going to take your clothes off now," Spencer says. "If your hands come off the line while I'm taking your shirt off, that's okay."

Brendon swallows. "Please," Brendon says, and he means it.

(One of the few things Spencer had asked him about—warned him about—was that he might want to take Brendon's clothing off, down to his underwear, and was that okay? Spencer didn't want it to be weird. He didn't want Brendon to feel uncomfortable.

No, Brendon had said. It's totally okay. He had been embarrassed by how much the idea had turned him on, shifting in his seat at the thought of Spencer's hands on his skin. His _bare_ skin.

Good, Spencer had said. I was hoping you'd say that.)

Brendon keeps his hands pressed to the wall as Spencer tugs the shirt up, even though Spencer's given him permission. He only lifts his hands when Spencer's got the shirt rucked up around his arms, lifting his palm and then his fingers so Spencer can tug it off. Brendon wants to tell himself it's because he's balanced so precariously—but it's more than that. There's something warm and tight in his stomach, something that suddenly wants to make Spencer happy.

Spencer doesn't say anything in return. He doesn't comment on Brendon's initiative, he just drops his arms and then reaches down to undo Brendon's jeans. His palms slide over Brendon's stomach and Brendon stays absolutely still, holding his breath. He's already hard, and there's no way he can hide it, and Spencer is going to feel it, feel him. The warmth in his stomach curls deeper. He feels Spencer pause for a moment, just a second, when he tugs the jeans over Brendon's erection. Brendon tucks his head into the crook of his elbow, hiding his face in the wall.

"Step up," Spencer says, as he's tugging the jeans down Brendon's legs. "Left, then right." Brendon's so distracted he moves them in the wrong order, and Spencer makes an amused noise from behind him. He waits until Brendon's stepped out of the jeans, and then he reaches up and pinches the back of Brendon's thigh, just under the band of his briefs. Brendon's muscles jump under his skin, and he jerks away from the touch.

"Concentrate, Brendon." Spencer says, and then he moves away. Brendon can hear him rummaging through something, hears the swish of a zipper. Brendon swallows, hard. He wonders if Spencer's taking his own pants off. God, he's not sure he can get through this if he—if they. Christ.

The air in the room is cool on his skin, on the backs of his thighs. Brendon shivers, and then tries not to. He shifts his weight, and the movement causes the fabric of his briefs to rub up against his skin, against the heavy weight of his balls, pulled up tight against his body. Brendon's almost out of laundry and he wishes he'd had anything else to wear—this pair is old, and worn thin, and tight enough that Spencer can see _everything._

(Except there's another part of him that wants to arch his back and show off, that wants Spencer to look and see him. Somewhere inside, Brendon thinks maybe he did this on purpose. He doesn't even know, anymore.)

"Step up," Spencer says, right next to Brendon's hip. Brendon gets the order right this time, lifting his left foot and then his right. He feels something soft slide up his legs, and then Spencer's settling a pair of basketball shorts around his hips and Brendon feels annoyed and relieved in equal measure. They fit well. Brendon wants to ask if Spencer bought them for _him_ , if he'd snuck off to a Sports Authority and stood there tilting his head and considering what he'd like to see Brendon in.

Or maybe they're just Ryan's old basketball shorts. Maybe Brendon's making too much out of this. Fuck, everything in his head is a mess. Brendon's thinking too much. His breath is coming sharp and fast.

Spencer hits him.

"Gnnugh," Brendon says, letting his mouth fall open in surprise. His spine tightens up immediately, and Brendon sucks in air. The next blow lands on the other side of his ass, and Brendon can feel the rush of air as Spencer's hand cuts through the distance between them. Fucking _christ._ He'd been expecting Spencer to go easy on him, Brendon thinks distantly. He'd been expecting a little time to warm up, to figure this out, but Spencer obviously isn't going to give him that time. He's hitting Brendon _hard._ Each blow stings on impact, and forces him to concentrate on remaining still. Spencer's hitting him hard enough that if Brendon doesn't tense his muscles to counteract the force, he'll fall over.

"Ow," Brendon whispers. His fingers slip against the wallpaper, and he pushes himself up with a sense of panic. "Five more," Spencer says, and he sounds—calm, almost. He sounds just like normal Spencer, but there's an edge of pleasure in his voice. Like he's happy about what he's doing, like he's enjoying watching Brendon squirm. Brendon pants against the wall. He tries to lose himself in the rhythm, but his body won't relax.

Spencer stops hitting him for a moment. Brendon sucks in more air. Trails of sparkles are starting to dance around the edges of his vision. He feels the flat of Spencer's palm between his shoulder blades, his thumb digging into a knot in the muscle just below his scapula. Brendon arches into it as much as he can. It sort of hurts, but compared to the spanking, it feels amazing.

"Good," Spencer says, softer. "In, and out. That's it." Brendon nods, unthinking. Yes. In and out, okay. He can do that. His chest rises and falls.

Spencer presses down on the knot, and Brendon feels his body tighten up before all of a sudden, the knot breaks. His spine straightens, his body shifting, and suddenly it's not so hard to reach the line with his fingers anymore.

"Thank you," Brendon chokes out, the words muffled by the press of his face against the wall. "You're welcome," Spencer says casually. Brendon can hear the smile in Spencer's voice, and then Spencer pulls his hand back and hits him, right on the curve of his ass. It feels different, this time around. Brendon finds himself curving into it, even through the pain. It fucking hurts, okay, it hurts a _lot_ and Brendon knows this, but all of a sudden his brain is just murmuring _more, more, yes, MORE._ Brendon wants it harder. He wants to push, wants to follow that strange thread of pleasure through the pain and see where it leads. He starts to let his fingers slip off the line.

"I should have known," Spencer mutters, from somewhere behind him. Brendon feels Spencer's hands in his hair, and then he's wrenching Brendon's head back. "No," Spencer says firmly. "You don't get to play with me like that. I know you can take it, so don't try to pretend you can't."

"Please," Brendon says, faintly. His face heats. He doesn't know what he was trying to do, only that somewhere in his brain he'd thought that maybe, maybe Spencer wouldn't notice he was faking. He pushes his fingers back up.

"If you want it that badly," Spencer says, "you're going to have to ask for it." Brendon swallows. He doesn't know what to do. He's not supposed to talk, so he can't ask for it with his voice. Except—

"Please," Brendon gasps. "Please, please—"

"No," Spencer says, and his hand stills against Brendon's ass. He covers it with his palm, rubbing his fingers into the bruise. "That's enough for now. If you want more, you need to earn it."

Brendon stills. He's just—there's so many _rules_ , and he doesn't know what to do, doesn't know how to navigate these new waters. Thinking isn't helping him, so Brendon just—stops. He tries to blank out his mind, to see nothing behind his eyelids but a stretch of bright white. It helps, a little.

Spencer leans into him again, covering Brendon's hands. Brendon can feel the stretch in his elbows, the tension of muscles held tight for too long.

"You have to trust me," Spencer whispers. His breath is hot against the side of Brendon's neck. He's carefully keeping his hips away from Brendon's ass, but Brendon can feel the heat from Spencer's skin, pouring off him in waves. Brendon nods. He _does_ trust Spencer. He wouldn't be doing this if he didn't, but he's having trouble giving up control.

He's trying to learn the rules, but—maybe there aren't any rules, Brendon realizes suddenly. There's what Spencer wants, and what Spencer's going to give him, and Brendon just needs to listen. Brendon just needs to try as hard as he can do to what Spencer wants him to do.

"Hands down," Spencer says, and he carefully draws Brendon's hands down. His fingers sting with pins and needles, and Brendon wants to open and close them and shake them around, but he doesn't. He keeps himself lax, safe in Spencer's hands.

"I knew you'd be good at this," Spencer rumbles, and Brendon feels that twist again, low in his stomach. His skin burns where Spencer hit him, even as he's cold everywhere else. He wants to wrap himself up in Spencer and never leave. He pushes back, involuntarily, seeking more contact.

"Careful," Spencer says, and pulls away. Brendon has a moment of panic before he realizes that Spencer's still holding on to his wrists, that he's guiding him backwards towards the bed. Brendon can't see where he's going, and he stumbles a bit. Spencer steadies him.

"More, Brendon," Spencer says. "A little farther." _Trust_ , Brendon thinks, shuffling backwards. _Okay. Yes. I trust him._ He feels like he has to be at the bed by now, but Spencer doesn't tell him to stop moving, so Brendon doesn't. A few more seconds, and then Brendon feels the press of Spencer's jeans against the back of his knees.

"Stop," Spencer says. He takes his hands away from Brendon's wrists, and Brendon wills himself to remain still. He wants to follow Spencer. He doesn't want to stand here by himself, shivering, but.

It's all a choice, really. It's a choice between what Brendon wants, and what Spencer wants, and somewhere, something's clicking into place. Brendon stays still.

"I want you to stretch out for me," Spencer says. "Arms above your head, and count to ten. Can you do that? Nod for me if you can." Brendon nods. He looks down at his feet, and then he raises his arms up, threading his fingers and catching them above his head. The movement pulls on sore skin and tissue. It feels good, and it hurts, and Brendon has to force himself to bring his hands back down once he's counted all the way up.

"Turn around," Spencer says, and Brendon shuffles around. Spencer's staring at him, calm and collected, but his cheeks are pink with exertion. He's stretching one of his hands out, splaying his fingers across his knee. He curls them in, tensing and releasing, and Brendon can't look away.

"I'd like you on my lap," Spencer says. "But if you don't want to, we can do this with you kneeling on the bed. I'm giving you a choice, Brendon. I'm not going to do this often, so I want you to really think about it."

Brendon nods. He knows he's still tenting the shorts out, and it's making it hard to concentrate on what Spencer's saying. He feels exposed. The thought of sitting on Spencer's lap is making it worse, making his cock twitch unconsciously. Brendon doesn't—he's never felt like this before. He feels like he could hold off forever, if Spencer wanted him too. He feels like if Spencer told him to come, right now, he could.

If Spencer—Spencer. Fuck. Brendon tries to focus.

"You can speak, just this once," Spencer says. "Unless you want to say your safeword. Tell me which one you want."

Brendon bites his lip. "You," Brendon croaks out, and his voice sounds harsh and foreign. It sounds like he's been in the studio all day, laying tracks without a break. "You choose," Brendon whispers. "I don't—you choose."

He watches Spencer's eyebrows raise a little. Spence looks pleased, and intrigued, and like he's trying to hide both of those emotions. "Hmm," Spencer says. "On my lap, then. Come here." Brendon shuffles forward, and Spencer smooths his fingers over Brendon's hipbones. He cradles them in his palms as he guides Brendon down, over his lap, face-down on the bed. Spencer's feet are on the floor, and Brendon's very, very close to the edge. He can balance himself here if he doesn't move at all.

"Hands up," Spencer says, and Brendon stretches out his arms above his head, curling his fingers slightly around the edge of the mattress. It gives him some stability. Something to cling to. It's reassuring.

He feels Spencer's hands smoothing over his ass, gentle and careful. His dick is trapped between Brendon's body, and Spencer's thigh. Brendon tries not to move. Maybe if he doesn't press himself into Spencer's leg, Spencer won't notice. Brendon wishes he could will his erection away, that he could be good for Spencer, but he _can't_.

God, Spencer's hands on his ass. Fuck.

Brendon presses his face further into the mattress, and that's when Spencer digs his fingers in. Brendon wishes he could remember how many times Spencer spanked him. Spencer presses down on the bruise, digging his index and pointer finger into the muscle. It's a thick, throbbing pain. Brendon whimpers.

Spencer takes his hand away. Brendon feels him fumbling somewhere near Brendon's right side, on the bed, and then he feels something soft and flexible in Spencer's hand.

"We're just starting," Spencer says. "It's going to get a lot worse. If you don't think you can stay quiet, I can gag you."

And oh, god. _Shit_. Brendon whimpers again, helplessly.

"That sounds like a yes," Spencer rumbles. "But I want you to say it out loud. Say "yes, please, Spencer."

Brendon closes his eyes. His breath is coming fast and jerky in his chest, and somehow it takes almost everything for him to open his mouth. To _ask_ for it, even though it must be so fucking obvious to Spencer that he loves this, that he's getting off on it like nothing else he'd ever experienced.

"Yes," Brendon mumbles, soft and pleading. "Please, Spencer."

"Louder," Spencer says.

Dammit. "Yes," Brendon says, clearing his throat, forcing the words out at normal volume. Thank god he doesn't have to look at Spencer while he says it. "Please, Spencer. _Please."_

"Good boy," Spencer murmurs, under his breath. It sounds like he's talking to himself, but Brendon feels his hips press down into Spencer's leg, all the same. Heat pools in his groin and shoots up his spine, and Brendon doesn't know why those two words are any different, but he's suddenly about to lose it right then and there.

"Open your mouth," Spencer says, and Brendon lifts his head up just enough for Spencer to push the fabric between his teeth. He's panting, sucking in too much air, and he bites down hard as soon as Spencer takes his fingers away. He feels the knot tighten against the back of his hair, the tug as Spencer tests it. He feels Spencer pick up one of his hands, the left one, and guide it down to Spencer's knee.

"If you need to safeword," Spencer says, "Dig your nails into my thigh and squeeze down and hold it. As hard as you can. Otherwise, I want you to keep your hands above your head. Nod if you think you can do that."

Brendon nods. The gag is already wet between his teeth. He flicks his tongue out and touches the fabric, hesitant and curious. It's a weird sensation, but Brendon likes the feeling of being able to bite down on something. He likes that he doesn't have to hold back the soft noises he keeps making. It feels like Spencer's helping him be good.

Spencer's fingers trace a slow path up his spine, to the nape of his neck and back again. Then he digs his nails in, hard, and rakes them down Brendon's back.

" _Fuck_ ," Brendon spits out, behind the gag. It's soft and muffled behind the fabric, and he tenses up, hoping Spencer didn't hear. There are ten searing trails down Brendon's back, sharp lines of pain that Spencer starts tracing over and over. He'll concentrate on one spot for a while and then start up a cross-hatching pattern, and the whole time Brendon can't stop whimpering behind the gag. It's an entirely different type of pain.

Brendon hates it, and he never wants it to stop.

His shoulders are the worst. Brendon had tensed up as soon as he'd felt Spencer's nails on his lower back, but he'd been able to bow his stomach out a little, to press down on his aching dick and Spencer's thigh. But then Spencer moves up to his shoulders, and he seems to really like that spot just along his spine. Brendon can feel him smoothing two fingers down the line of Brendon's back and then coming back and digging his nails in, and there's just—there's nowhere for Brendon to go. His shoulders are locked tight above his head, and he can't push himself any farther away. He groans, and breathes wetly through the gag and tries not to make too much noise.

"Shhhh," Spencer says. "You're being so good for me. I know you're trying so hard. So good, Brendon. Just stay still."

Brendon feels Spencer's hands smooth out, the flat of his palm sliding down the curve of Brendon's spine. Brendon thinks about what his back must look like right now, endless rows of raised red marks. They'll fade soon enough, but right now his back is on fire. He whimpers as Spencer presses down on the marks.

"Pretty," Spencer murmurs, almost too soft for Brendon to hear.

Brendon feels Spencer's hands move lower, smoothing over his ass again. Before today, Brendon has seriously never had anyone pay this much attention to his ass in his life. He's had girls grab it during sex, forcing him to speed up or go deeper, but he's never felt—god, anything like this. He's laid out on Spencer's lap, completely exposed even through the fabric.

He feels Spencer's thumb travel lower, pushing his cheeks apart through the thin fabric of his shorts. Brendon squirms on Spencer's lap, unable to help himself. He's scared for the first time. Not because of Spencer, but because he's seen what Spencer can do.

Whatever he's planning, it's going to hurt so, so much.

Spencer pulls his hand back and slaps the underside of Brendon's balls. Brendon bites down on the gag. The pain rolls through him, leaves him hypersensitive and shaking. He feels Spencer's hand traveling lower, and then Spencer's fingers on his perineum. Brendon pushes back without thinking, and Spencer pinches him viciously. Brendon yelps behind his gag, too loud for either of them to pretend he's being silent. Spencer pulls his hand back, and Brendon can't even get up the energy to tense into it. He's quiet and still as Spencer slaps him five times, directly below his balls, pinching once for good measure.

It's all just white noise. Brendon can't even think straight. His body is a mass of nerves, of sensation, and that's when he feels Spencer's hands traveling down his legs, strong pressure that Brendon can't help but melt into. Spencer rubs his thumb along the arch of Brendon's foot, bending Brendon's leg at the knee so it's easier for him to reach. Brendon's been cramping his toes for the past hour, and the sensation of the muscles being loosened under Spencer's hands is so good that Brendon starts shivering again.

It's complete fucking sensory overload, and Brendon feels himself slowly start to drift off. His breathing slows down to a crawl, to a lazy exhale when Spencer really gets into a knot. Spencer avoids the places he's bruised and scratched, concentrating instead on places Brendon's never even considered; the backs of his arms, the juncture between thumb and index finger, the place where Brendon's head meets his spine. Spencer rubs at him carefully, gently, sometimes not even massaging so much as petting.

When Spencer finally takes his hands away, Brendon's almost asleep. He wants to open his mouth, to mumble a question about what happens next, but he doesn't really care. It doesn't matter. Even his erection doesn't really matter, still hard and painful between his hips. It's all just—whatever. Brendon's happy. His body feels good.

"If you were a cat," Spencer says, breaking the silence between them, "I think you'd be purring right now."

"Wha?" Brendon says, lifting his head a little. He feels Spencer's fingers untying the gag, smoothing over his jaw muscles as they lift the fabric out of the way. Brendon opens his mouth obediently, and lets it go.

"We're done for now," Spencer says. He shifts a little, his hands coming back to rest on Brendon's hips. "Think you can stand up? You'll be more comfortable with a pillow."

"Mmm," Brendon says. A small part of his brain informs him that he's being completely unhelpful, but he just—can't handle it right now. Choices are way too complicated. He wants more of the haze, more of Spencer's hands on him. He wants to lie here and never move.

"Hey," Spencer says quietly. His voice is fond. "Bden. Help me out here, okay?"

" 'kay," Brendon mumbles. He tries to sit up. It doesn't work quite so well, but apparently it's enough to get him into Spencer's arms. Spencer doesn't bother with formalities; he just picks Brendon up, like a virgin bride, and deposits him at the head of the bed. Brendon sinks into the mattress with a pleased sigh. The cotton is soft against all his hurty places.

"I'm going to go into the bathroom and get you some water," Spencer says. "I'll be right back, okay? I'm not going anywhere."

"Mmmph," Brendon says. The last thing he's aware of is the whir of the bathroom fan and the sound of Spencer's footsteps on the tile.

-

Brendon wakes up an empty room, a glass of water perspiring on the table next to him. The air conditioner is turned down low, and there's a piece of paper sitting under the glass. Brendon blinks, and throws out a hand towards the glass. His brain is muddy, still half-fogged from sleep.

He closes his hand around the tumbler, and brings it to his lips. He drinks it greedily, and when it's empty, he's still thirsty.

The glass of water has left a smudged ring on the note. It says in Spencer's handwriting that he had to leave for a little bit, that he's sorry and he has his cell phone and Brendon should call him when he wakes up. Brendon puts the note back on the table and sinks back into the mattress. He has a vague memory of Spencer's body curled up around him, of hands smoothing back his hair. He thinks Spencer must have left recently, because the bed is still warm.

It's almost good, Brendon thinks, through the fog. He fumbles in the covers until he finds the remote. The shades are pulled down low, but he can tell it's past dark. They'd gotten to the hotel sometime around four pm. He has no idea what time it is.

The TV clicks on with a burst of color and motion, but no sound. Brendon frowns at it for a moment before hitting the "mute" button. The sound kicks in, loud in the small space. He lowers the volume until it's a soft murmur, sinking further under the covers.

Brendon watches TV for a while. Long enough that by the time the credits roll for Law and Order: SVU, he's feeling slightly more awake. It's almost nice to just be here, alone. There's too many emotions tucked inside his chest, jostling for space, and Brendon doesn't know which one he wants to feel so he feels none of them. He clicks around until he finds Adult Swim, and then stares blankly at Robot Chicken.

He hears the click of the door, and jumps slightly. He turns his head to see Spencer pushing the door open with his shoulder, carrying two sodas and a plastic take-out bag. He's wearing a damp t-shirt and flip-flops, and there's a hotel towel tossed over his shoulder. His hair is wet.

"Hey," Brendon mumbles. Spencer looks up at him, surprised, like he hadn't expected Brendon to be awake.

"Hey," Spencer says. He sets down the sodas on the side table, and Brendon reaches his hand out. He stops just before he makes contact. "Are they different?" Brendon says.

"No," Spencer says, placing the take-out bag on the floor and chucking the towel across the room, into the bathroom. "They're both Pepsi. They didn't have Coke."

"Lame," Brendon murmurs. He takes a sip. It's aggressively cold and fizzy.

"I brought food," Spencer says, after a slightly awkward pause. "I figured. Are you hungry?"

"I could eat," Brendon agrees. Hunger isn't the most overwhelming sensation in his body at the moment, but the more he thinks about it, the more it sounds like a good idea.

"Okay," Spencer says. He starts unpacking something, some kind of plates with plastic tops like the kind you get at Boston Market, and Brendon turns back to the TV.

"Here," Spencer says, sliding a plate on Brendon's lap. "Careful. It's really hot." Brendon looks down, and blinks in surprise. It's steak, a thick sirloin. It's obviously from someplace a lot nicer than they usually eat. There's garlic mashed potatoes and creamed spinach and everything is garnished, even on the take-out tray.

"Wow," Brendon says dumbly. "I. Is that from downstairs?"

"Don't worry about it," Spencer says. He settles back on the bed, next to Brendon, with his own plate. He's gone for the sweet potatoes and mixed vegetables.

"Is that where you went?" Brendon asks, cutting himself a piece. It comes out a little large, but he shoves it in his mouth anyway. It's medium rare, exactly the way he likes it. Which is weird, considering how long he spent as a vegetarian, but oh well. It's good when it's juicy.

"I got Zack to pick this up," Spencer says. He reaches across Brendon and snags one of the sodas. "I—ah. Usually afterwards, sometimes I need to just—be alone for a little while."

"Oh," Brendon says. He doesn't know how he feels about that. He nods uselessly.

"I'm not—I wouldn't have left you." Spencer says. "I didn't leave until after you fell asleep. I just needed to, like—" Spencer looks across the room, towards the windows with the shades pulled down. "Recenter," Spencer finishes, after a moment. "I went swimming. Sometimes I go work out. Go for a run."

"Huh," Brendon says, because he doesn't know what to say. Spencer's weird midnight runs on their first tour are suddenly making sense.

"Is that okay?" Spencer says, and he turns to face Brendon.

"Yeah," Brendon says, after a minute. He swirls a piece of his steak in the spinach. "That's okay." His brain still feels foggy, but he thinks he's alright with it. It's not like Spencer just dropped him in bed and left. Brendon gets it. He's pretty sure that if they'd stopped earlier, before Spencer had practically massaged his brain out of his body, Brendon would have been equally jittery and restless.

It's quiet between them for a while. The silence feels pregnant, but not uncomfortable. It's like they're both considering what to say to each other. It's an unusual feeling, for Brendon, but it's kind of refreshing. He doesn't usually think too hard about what comes out of his mouth.

"Do you want to talk about it now?" Spencer says, eventually. "Or do you want to wait until later?"

"Later," Brendon says. "I—yeah. Later. I'm still all—" he waves his fork around in the air.

"Sure," Spencer says. He puts his food down by the side of the bed, and unsubtly scoots closer to Brendon on the bed.

"It's okay," Brendon says, with a tiny smile. "You don't have to—you know. I didn't mean I'm still. In that kind of place."

"I know," Spencer says placidly. He runs his thumb over the curve of Brendon's shoulder. "But if you want—I'm here. If you want."

Brendon looks down at the remains of his dinner. There's still a decent amount of food, but he's rapidly starting to be full. He pushes his knees up, lifting the plate off his lap and setting it aside.

"That would be nice," Brendon says, quietly. He settles into Spencer's side, and Spencer's arm tightens around him. "Thanks for dinner."

"No problem," Spencer says, equally quietly.

-

They're back on the bus by 5am, bleary eyed and fumbling. Ryan stops behind Brendon in the kitchenette, and hesitates a moment before patting Brendon in the middle of the back.

"You still dying of food poisoning?" Ryan says. "Are you going to throw up on us?" Brendon snorts.

"I think I'll be okay," Brendon mumbles, trying not to smile. "I feel a lot better."

"Okay," Ryan says. He pauses. "I was going to say, like, you can totally throw up on me if you need to, but then I realized that's really fucked up and I don't want you to do that at all."

"Dude," Brendon says. "Ryan. Go back to _bed."_

"Good idea," Ryan says. He shuffles off towards the bunks. Brendon shakes his head at the universe.

-

The daily grind is intense as the tour winds ever closer to the finish. Brendon's sore for a few days. He tries not to wince in front of Ryan or Jon or Zack. There's no time to sit down and have like, a heart-to-heart with Spencer about how Brendon's brain is still sort of all fizzy and how that was the most intense experience of his life and how Brendon's nervous and excited and scared to do it again. He's not even sure he really _wants_ to say that to Spencer, because Brendon's pretty sure it was a one-time deal. There's no point in decompressing to Spencer if they're not going to do it again.

Brendon really fucking wants to do it again.

Spencer's strangely gentle with him. He's still as acerbic as ever, but his touches are warmer. They linger just past the bounds of proprietary, even for them. At first Brendon thinks it's because Spencer feels bad, that he was worried he'd been too hard on Brendon. That thought evaporates the first time he sees Spencer watching him stretch out, wincing a little at the pull of muscles. Spencer's gaze is heavy, pointed, and he smiles at Brendon slowly and raises one eyebrow. Brendon swallows, and turns away before he can embarrass himself in public.

-

The night before their last show, Brendon tears a piece of paper out of one of Ryan's notebooks. He writes _thank you_ on it and leaves it on Spencer's bunk, peeking out from under his pillow.

-

They're in California again.

Even through the exhaustion, Brendon is _psyched_. He's finally gotten that guy on the phone, John, the guy from Tattoo Syndicate. He's going to bring his needles and meet them at the Honda Center and make Brendon's tattoo look even more awesome.

"I'm thinking like, flowers," Brendon says, sucking down his latte. "Or skulls. Piano skulls. A big skull with a piano down the center."

Jon looks up at him. He's strumming his guitar with one hand, stretched out on his back on the floor. "You don't know what you're adding yet?" Jon says. "Dude. Brendon. _Dude."_

"What?" Brendon says.

"That way lies madness," Jon says, shaking his head. "You're going to end up with a picture of someone's dog, or something."

"Piano-dog," Brendon says, nodding. "I like it."

"It really scares me that you're considered an adult," Ryan mumbles. "No one like you should have a credit card."

"You fell out of your own bunk this morning," Brendon replies. "Like, ten minutes ago."

"There was a curve," Ryan says. "The bus tilted. On the road."

"We were in a parking lot," Spencer says. He's sitting next to Brendon on the couch, one hand on the Xbox controller and one hand way in the bottom of a bag of Cheetos. He's rustling around like he's going to find more in there, but Brendon knows it's a lost cause, since he already ate the good ones and then put the bag back in the kitchen.

"It's windy in California," Ryan says. Jon reaches over and pats him on the knee.

-

 _excited?_ the text message says. Brendon bites his lip a little. It's from Spencer, of course it is. It's from Spencer who probably saw right through him this morning.

 _yeah,_ Brendon sends back. His phone beeps a minute or so later.

 _is he going to do it backstage?_ the message reads. Brendon rolls his eyes a little.

 _no, in the Pacific Ocean,_ Brendon types. _Of course he's doing it backstage where else would he do it._

His phone buzzes five minutes later.

 _good,_ the text message says. _I want to watch._

-

The hum of the tattoo needle is a comforting buzz in the green room. It hurts like a fucking bitch. John's tracing the outline of the flowers he'd shown Brendon, the nice big hibiscus clusters that mute the sharp edges of the piano keys. He's doing the sensitive skin on the inside of Brendon's arm and oh, god, it hurts.

"You want to take a break?" John says, wiping away some ink. "We can stop for a bit if you're feeling dizzy."

"I'm good," Brendon says, through clenched teeth. He is, that's the thing. He's so good he's kind of afraid to stand up. He doesn't really want the rest of his band to see how _good_ he really is.

Across the room, Spencer raises an eyebrow at him. He's watching Brendon carefully, looking away every once and a while so he doesn't come across as too intense. Ryan's already made fun of him for it, for being so fascinated, but Spencer had just smacked him and said he liked watching the process.

"I thought it was cool when you got yours, too," Spencer says, and Ryan laughs. "Yeah," Ryan says. "Didn't the artist have to tell you to back the fuck off, because you were getting in his light?"

"Maybe," Spencer says, shrugging a little. "Didn't he threaten to strap you down because you were squirming around so much?"

"No," Ryan says, frowning. He's rubbing at the insides of his wrists, like he's chasing the phantom pain. "You're making that up. I was an ideal tattooing-virgin. I was hardcore."

"Brendon's pretty hardcore," Jon says, nodding back towards him. Brendon makes a stupid face at him, pursing his lips and screwing up his cheeks. Jon grins. "I'm totally impressed. He's barely even moved."

"I like to live dangerously," Brendon says. His words are coming out slightly breathier than normal. He's almost having trouble focusing on the conversation. It's just the linework, really. Once John's done with the outline he'll start doing the fills, and Brendon remembers barely noticing that part on his first one. It's buzzy, and itchy, but it's not the sharp, stinging lines of pain that are radiating down Brendon's arm.

Brendon tips his head back, breathing in deep. He pulls the air in, holds it for three beats, and then pushes it out, and as he's exhaling he makes the mistake of looking right at Spencer. Brendon darts his gaze away, but he's not quick enough to avoid that split second of eye contact.

Spencer looks _fascinated._

He's doing a good job of hiding it, but it's definitely there. Spencer's mouth is open slightly, and he's leaning forward to get a better view. He looks—excited, almost. Not excited, like, hey, here's my dick, but excited in an, a—-Brendon struggles in his own head for an analogy. Spencer looks kind of like a kid in a candy shop, maybe. Ryan and Jon are arguing over the last Vitamin Water and Spencer looks like Christmas has come early. Brendon can't look at him, or he's going to lose it.

"There," John says, pulling away. The buzzing noise cuts off, and Brendon blinks. His arm is still on fire, but the sensation is rapidly fading. He takes another deep breath. He's suddenly able to feel how cold it is in the room, how high the air conditioning is cranked up. He's sweating, and the drops are chilling on his forehead.

"Done with the linework," John says, wiping at the raised marks with an antiseptic-wipe. "Have a snack before we do the color, dude. I think you're getting a little light-headed on me. Your breathing got all funny there at the end."

"Yeah," Brendon says, nodding uselessly. _don't look at spencer don't look at spencer don't look at spencer._ "Sure. No problem."

-

They're driving back to Las Vegas, because Ryan has this weird love of driving through the desert, and also it's kind of easier than trying to co-ordinate family schedules and airport-pick-ups. Shane's staying with a friend in Cali for the week they have off. He salutes them ironically as he opens the cab door to get in. Jon's sitting in the back already, feet kicked up on his carry-on. He's flying back to Chicago, because Jon is a real boy who has a long-term significant other and a house full of cats waiting for him.

"Yeah, yeah," Brendon says. He wiggles Shane's beanie around on his head and hopes futilely it messes his hair up. Shane ducks into the cab, laughing and giving him the finger.

Brendon's already got his bag packed for the ride. He doesn't pretend to know where his stuff _really_ goes during these weird pseudo-breaks; he's packed a bag with everything he can't live without, and the rest of it will hopefully meet them in Germany. He's bringing his old acoustic back to his condo, just in case.

Spencer pulls up to the venue in the rental car, eventually. Ryan's sitting in the front seat with a Slurpee.

"Fuck you," Brendon says. "We have a five hour drive, you couldn't wait until you got back here to get Slurpees?"

"It's cool," Ryan says. "I kind of have to piss. We can stop for you then."

"Whatever," Brendon says, shaking his head. He bangs on the trunk until Spencer pops the latch, and then shoves his suitcase in the back with the rest of them. He's going to be sitting with his guitar case on his lap for the whole trip, he just knows it.

It's a pretty boring drive, really. Brendon's done it too many times for it to be exciting. Ryan takes over when they leave civilization and head into the desert, because even if he gets distracted and goes off the road, it's not like there's anything for him to run into. Brendon tips his head back against the uncomfortable head-rest and falls asleep with his mouth open.

He's kind of still in a daze when they finally pull up to his little condo. Brendon pats clumsily at Ryan through the open window, flaps his hand at Spencer in the passenger's seat, and then drags his suitcase into the lobby. Thank God his building has elevators. Brendon is going to sleep for a week, and he kind of wants to start right now. In the elevator.

-

Brendon wakes up on the couch with his shoes still on. There's light pouring through the cracks in the curtains, and he groans and stumbles blearily over to tug them shut. He stands there for a moment afterwards, completely disorientated, until he remembers he's in his condo in Las Vegas. It still doesn't really feel like home, but at least the ground isn't moving underneath him.

Brendon yawns. He stretches out, listening to a satisfying litany of cracks and pops before dropping his arms and releasing the tension. Then he stumbles into his kitchen to see if there's anything still left over from the last time he was home two months ago. After a thorough search of his cupboards and refrigerator, he comes up with a can of soup, some saltines, four two-liter bottles of Dr. Pepper, and something in a box that's being slowly eaten by the back of his freezer.

It's probably worth a trip to the supermarket.

Brendon doesn't bother looking in the mirror; he just goes into to the bathroom, pisses, brushes his teeth, and grabs his keys. The heat hits him like a wall during the short walk from his front door to his car. It's at least 100 degrees out, maybe more. Brendon definitely doesn't miss the heat.

Brendon stops for iced coffee and donuts, and eats them sitting in the parking lot of the supermarket with the air conditioner running. He grabs a cart once he's finished, pushing it in front of him through the automatic doors and trying not to accidentally touch the metal. It's weird how his old habits kick in automatically.

Brendon wanders through the store, picking up anything that looks interesting. Even when he's home, he usually eats out most nights, but he needs things like milk and cereal and frozen waffles. He's contemplating whether he wants fake-blueberry or fake-apple flavor when he hears a familiar noise, a sort of sad and frustrated "hmmph." He looks up to see Spencer standing just down the aisle, staring fixedly at the frozen bagels.

"Hey," Brendon says, blinking a little. "What are you doing here?"

"Wha-Oh. Hey," Spencer says, a pleased smile breaking out on his face at the sight of Brendon. "I was on my way to ring your doorbell until you woke up."

"Really?" Brendon says, after a beat. "Uh—why?"

"Bored," Spencer says, shrugging. "Ryan's still dead to the world. And then I remembered you lived like a block away from a supermarket and figured I'd kill two birds with one stone."

"Right," Brendon says, nodding. He tilts his head towards the frozen bagel selection. "So what's so upsetting with the bagels?"

"No cinnamon raisin," Spencer says, frowning slightly. "It's a fucking travesty."

"It is," Brendon agrees. He dumps the rest of his basket in Spencer's cart. "Anyway. I'm about to go check out. Other than the tragic lack of bagels, is there anything else you need?"

"I think I'm good," Spencer says, eyeing his cart critically. He shrugs, and then starts pushing it up the aisle. Brendon follows him to the register, unloading the cart while Spencer walks to the end to start bagging. By the time he's got everything on the conveyor belt, Spencer's already swiped his debit card to pay for everything.

"Did you—oh," Brendon says. "I was going to pay for mine."

"Just buy me dinner or something," Spencer says. "It's faster this way."

"Okay," Brendon says.

-

Five hours later, and halfway through an epic Guitar Hero grudge match, Brendon realizes he probably should have called his family to tell them he's home.

"Crap," Brendon says, missing a string of notes and totally fucking up his score. "I forgot to call my mom. Did you call your parents yet?"

"Yeah, I'm going over for dinner on Thursday," Spencer says. "I might stop by sooner. You want to come with and say hi?"

"Uh, yeah," Brendon says. Spencer's mom is an awesome cook. Brendon loves his own mother, but she really can't compare to Ginger's epic lasagna skills.

"Cool," Spencer says. He pauses as the last notes fade away. "Actually. I'm kind of hungry."

"You want pizza?" Brendon says, scrolling through the contacts on his phone. He's trying to remember if he should call his mom's work number, or her cell. He can't remember if she's got a big project going on at the moment, but when she does, it's usually easier to just call her office.

"Actually," Spencer says. "Um. I was thinking. You know that dinner you owe me?" Brendon looks up, confused. Spencer's voice sounds a little—off. He sounds almost hesitant. There's a faint pink tinge on the tops of his cheekbones, right where his freckles are.

"Yeah?" Brendon says.

"There's this little Italian place near my condo," Spencer says. "I kind of wanted to check it out."

"I—Oh," Brendon says. "Sure. Okay." His stomach feels a little weird, fluttery in odd places. It feels like Spencer's asking him out on a date. Brendon can't explain why this is different from all the times they've eaten out together, but it just feels—new, somehow. It feels like his world has suddenly started to shift when he wasn't looking.

"Cool," Spencer says. He looks away, running his fingers through his hair and pushing it off his face. Spencer's hair is getting really long. Brendon likes it. Spencer's handsome, always has been, but this new beard-and-shiny hair thing he's got going on really suits him.

Brendon shakes his head to clear it. He doesn't know why he's thinking about this now, all of a sudden. It's not like he didn't know that Spencer was hot. He's in a band full of guys that made themselves famous by playing fun music, being hot, and pretending to have an epic gay love affair onstage.

"Which car should we take?" Brendon says. "Or should we take two separate ones?"

"I'll drive," Spencer says. "I don't mind coming back here to drop you off. I miss driving."

"Okay," Brendon says, biting his lip. Spencer smiles at him, small and unexpectedly shy. He jingles his car keys in his hand.

The Italian place turns out to be very small and very good, but not particularly Italian. It's actually a Greek place, which amuses Brendon to no end. Spencer just waves him off, sipping at his water and saying that really, Italy and Greece aren't that far away from each other.

"Didn't you pay attention in history class?" Spencer says. "They're like, right across the water from each other. That's why they kept invading each other."

"Are you talking about Brindisi?" Brendon says. "The heel of the boot? Because that's across from Albania."

"Uh," Spencer says. "Okay, but like, I bet that was part of _ancient_ Greece—"

"You are seriously just making this up, aren't you," Brendon says, grinning. "You have _no idea_ what you're actually talking about."

"Kind of," Spencer admits. "But I'm not wrong. This is a question for Wikipedia. I know they invaded each other."

"That was World War Two," Brendon says.

"Oh," Spencer says. "Wait, how the hell do you know all this stuff?"

"I paid attention in history class," Brendon says smugly. Spencer gives him a skeptical look. "Okay, and I'm reading a history of Western Europe right now," Brendon admits. "It's pretty interesting."

"I knew there was a catch," Spencer says. His tone is fond, and he's smoothing his thumb over the condensation dripping down the outside of his water glass. Brendon suddenly finds himself completely unable to look away from Spencer's hands.

It's so weird, how he's fixating on this, all of a sudden. Brendon remembers when Spencer was just his best friend, the guy he leaned on when he didn't have anyone else. Brendon had suspected this would change things between them, but he hadn't realized how _much_. He can't even decide if he's happy or sad about this new development. It's somewhere in the middle, a slightly bittersweet awareness of—-something. Of what they could have had in another life, maybe. Another life where they both actively sought out relationships with guys, instead of casually experimental hook-ups or idle thoughts. Another life where they weren't in a band together and weren't constantly on tour and there wasn't this padding of heavy memories between them, comforting but providing a solid wall, all the same.

It's kind of a depressing train of thought. Brendon shakes his head to push the thoughts away, and that's when Spencer opens his mouth.

"I was thinking," Spencer says, staring fixedly just over Brendon's left shoulder. "We should probably talk about things if we're going to do it again."

"You want to talk about it here?" Brendon says, frowning. He ignores the sudden surge in his stomach, the excitement that rushes through him just at the thought of getting to do that again.

"No, not here," Spencer says. "I just meant. If you wanted to—We've got all week, I figured. There's lots of time to, like. Try some things out. There's still a lot more you haven't tried."

Brendon swallows.

"If you still want to," Spencer says, slightly concerned. Brendon realizes he's gone absolutely still, and that Spencer must be mistaking his distraction for disapproval.

"I—yeah," Brendon says. "I didn't think—okay. Yeah. I would. I would really like that." His voice sounds a little off, like he's speaking too fast and too carelessly.

"Okay," Spencer says. "But we need to talk about stuff first. Not a lot, just—the basics. What you liked, what you didn't like, that sort of thing. Because that's all stuff I need to know."

"I didn't think you'd want to do it again," Brendon blurts out, unable to help himself. "I was. I wasn't very good, last time. I tried." And wow, hey, admitting that out loud feels sort of like being slapped in the face, and not in the good way. Brendon can feel himself starting to flush, and he looks away.

"Brendon," Spencer says slowly, after a pause. "I. Why would you think that?"

"Um," Brendon says. He doesn't want to go into details. They're sitting in a Greek restaurant and even though Brendon is being careful to keep his words very vague, he's still slightly paranoid that everyone knows what they're talking about. He can't just blurt out, _I couldn't keep quiet and I tried to rub myself off on your knee while you were hurting me._

"You're right, this isn't the place," Spencer says, shaking his head. "Sorry. I shouldn't have asked you that. But—look, Brendon, look at me."

"Yeah?" Brendon says, swallowing again and forcing himself to meet Spencer's gaze.

"You were amazing," Spencer says firmly. "Everything you did—we'll talk more at my place, but obviously I'm the one that fucked up, if you didn't realize that." Spencer looks down at the tabletop, and then back up at Brendon. "I've never seen anyone, just. Get into it like that on their very first try."

"Oh," Brendon says.

"Yeah," Spencer says. "So."

Brendon's saved from answering by the arrival of their appetizers. He's quietly grateful.

-

"My place?" Spencer says, shrugging his jacket on as they walk out the doors. The maitre'd gives them an odd look, and Brendon has the insane urge to giggle. Thank god there's no fans anywhere. He knows exactly how incriminating this looks.

"Okay," Brendon says.

"We don't have to just talk," Spencer says. "If you wanted to—Tonight, I mean. I'd be okay with that."

"Holy shit, yes," Brendon blurts out, and then feels immediately stupid. Spencer blinks for a moment, and then starts laughing quietly.

"Okay then," Spencer says, shooting him one of those blinding smiles. "Thanks for summing up my feelings on the subject as well."

"Um," Brendon says, feeling completely embarrassed. "I just—wait, really?"

"Brendon, I wouldn't do this if I didn't like it," Spencer says. "I'm a nice person, but I'm not _that_ nice."


	3. Chapter 3

"I don't know," Brendon says again. He shrugs, awkwardly, and then looks away. "It was good, I guess? I liked all of it." He feels uncomfortable, tense and overexposed.

Spencer's just asking him questions; they'd gotten back to Spencer's place and they'd sat down and Spencer had just kind of launched right into it and Brendon had just—frozen up. He doesn't know why it's so hard for him to say this stuff out loud. It just feels like he's telling a secret, one that he's not supposed to tell. He can't seem to make his mouth form the words.

Spencer looks at him for a long moment, and then he shakes his head and sighs, dropping his head into both of his hands. "I'm really bad at this part," Spencer says ruefully, once he's raised his head back up. "I'm. Shit, I'm sorry, Brendon. Don't—don't look at me like that."

"Like what?" Brendon says. He looks back down at his lap, at his hand curled around his water glass.

"Like you're going to cry, or something," Spencer says. "Shit."

"I'm not going to cry," Brendon says, even though it sort of feels like he might. It's not Spencer's fault, not really. Brendon doesn't really understand where all of this is coming from, but he wants to run out of the room and hide somewhere.

"Okay," Spencer says. "Okay. I'm sorry. Let's just—let's just hang out for a bit. I won't push you anymore, I promise."

"Okay," Brendon says. He takes a deep breath, and tries to relax back into Spencer's couch cushions. Spencer's couch is leather, large and overstuffed and really squishy. Brendon knows for a fact that Spencer bought it on sale but that it was still way, way too expensive for a couch. Spencer had been really adorably reticent about it, mumbling something about how it was a heirloom piece and was going to last a lifetime, while Jon laughed at him and Ryan shrugged and said _his_ couch had cost more. They'd all gone furniture shopping for their new places around the same time, so for like two weeks their interactions had mostly consisted of conversations about carpet fibers and window treatments and whether or not it was stupid to match the throw pillows to the wallpaper. Zack still made fun of them relentlessly about it.

"I'll be right back," Spencer says, after a few minutes where they just stare in silence at the TV. "I have an idea."

"Did it hurt?" Brendon says. It elicits a tiny smile from Spencer over his shoulder, and Brendon feels his chest start to ease up. He's okay. They're okay. He can do this.

Spencer comes back in with a cardboard box stuffed with an assortment of household items. He puts it down on Brendon's lap, and then sits on the other end of the couch and looks at Brendon expectantly.

"...okay?" Brendon says, poking at the stuff in the box. "Spence, what the hell?"

"Just take a look," Spencer says, leaning forward to grab the remote off the coffee table. "That's what I have. Tell me if anything looks interesting, and we'll go from there."

"Oh," Brendon says, tilting his head in confusion. He wonders if Spencer made a mistake and grabbed the wrong box, because the first thing he sees is a packet of clothespins and a rubber ball of elastics. He picks up the clothespins and waves them at Spencer. "Why do you have these?"

"Oh," Spencer says. "Um. Do you remember—I sent you some pictures, I think. A while ago. With the girl, and she was tied up, and—"

"Oh," Brendon says, swallowing. Right. He does remember that. More specifically, he remembers jerking off to it. He sets the clothespins down, and picks up the rubber band ball. "But why the rubber bands?"

Spencer rolls his eyes. "Gimme," he says, and Brendon tosses it across the couch. Spencer tugs one off, makes a finger gun at Brendon, and then fires it. It hits him right in the jugular, and Brendon jumps. "Ow," Brendon says, snickering a little. "Fuck, dude. That _hurt_."

"Yes," Spencer says patiently. "That's the point."

"Dumbass," Brendon says fondly. "So what, is this all just random stuff that you found around your house?" It's kind of a hot idea—Spencer wandering around and thinking about stuff carefully and then tucking it all away so he can grab it if he needs to—but it seems like he could have just stashed it in a drawer or something.

"No," Spencer says, shaking his head. He's—is he blushing? Brendon is instantly fascinated. Spencer's blushed twice tonight. Something has to be up. "Take everything out. There's other stuff in there too."

"Hmm," Brendon says. He starts unpacking the box, laying things out on the couch. He sees a wooden paddle near the top, smooth mahogany wood polished to a slick finish. He swallows and lifts it out. "Oh," Brendon says. "Dude. How much did that cost?" It's not big, but it looks hand-made. It feels expensive.

"I don't know," Spencer says, shrugging. "I picked it up in Amsterdam, at this little shop. It's—it was nice. I liked it."

"Right," Brendon says. He sets it aside and continues exploring. There's a few things that make him laugh—a flogger, an actual honest-to-god flogger, and while some small part of Brendon thinks that's incredibly hot, he can't get over the image of Spencer blushing and mumbling in a sex store while trying to purchase it. Spencer grins at him a little when Brendon realizes he's said that thought out loud.

"I bought it online," Spencer says, and then he's looking at Brendon thoughtfully, eyes moving back and forth between the toy in Brendon's hand, and Brendon, and then it's not so much funny as just hot. Brendon puts it down quickly.

He finds some other interesting things. Something Spencer says is a pinwheel, which looks like an angry pizza cutter. An actual blindfold, carefully folded, and a set of cuffs that Brendon can't help rubbing between his thumb and his forefinger, because they're really soft. There's a larger set, too, that Brendon kind of stares at for a while in confusion before holding them up and waving them at Spencer.

"Oh," Spencer says, reddening. "Those are for, um. They go around someone's thighs."

"Huh," Brendon says. He licks his lips. "You know, now I _really_ don't believe you when you say you only did this with Tom."

"Uh," Spencer says. He ducks his head. "I mean. A few other people. But not much." Spencer looks back at Brendon. "I just like to shop," Spencer says, completely embarrassed and Brendon bursts out laughing before he can help it.

"Shut up," Spencer says miserably, as Brendon snickers. "You know I do, why is that so funny?"

"Because you sit around and shop for _sex toys_ ," Brendon says, amused and unable to hide it. "What would Ryan say?"

"I never want to find out," Spencer says, wincing. "He'd probably want to give me fashion tips."

"Probably," Brendon says. There's one more thing in the box, a weird sort of small pot with a metal holder. It takes him a while to place it, but once he does he can't stop grinning. "Spencer," Brendon says, holding it up so he can see it. "Tell me this isn't a fondue pot."

"It's a fondue pot," Spencer says. "Okay, but wait, that one actually makes sense—"

"Explain to me how this makes sense," Brendon says. He's so fucking amused, oh man. This entire thing is priceless.

"It's for wax," Spencer says, looking at him with dark eyes, and all of a sudden Brendon's laughter fades away. "I got a tip from this girl at a store one time. I was looking at candles, just browsing, and she was telling me that she likes to use an electric fondue pot so you can control the temperature."

"Oh," Brendon breathes. When he looks closer, he can see that there's a tiny bit of wax melted in the bottom, like Spencer had tried it out after he'd purchased it. He rubs his finger along the waxy spot, and Brendon gets a sudden sense memory of being fourteen and his mom telling him over and over again to stop playing with the decorative candles on the dinner table. He used to stick his fingers in the wax over and over again, fascinated by the sharp sting and the way it cooled and hardened so quickly.

"I've never done it to someone else," Spencer says, watching Brendon closely. "But I know how high the temperature can go before it actually really hurts you."

"How high?" Brendon says. He's aware that his breathing has speeded up slightly.

"About a hundred and thirty," Spencer says, shaking his hand in the universal sign for 'it's variable.' "Maybe a hundred and fifty. Definitely not higher, then you'd start blistering."

"You tried it out on yourself?" Brendon says. He runs his fingers over the wax again, hard and unyielding in the bottom of the pot. "Did it hurt?"

"Yes," Spencer says.

"Right," Brendon says. He takes a deep breath and sets the fondue pot down. He looks at Spencer. "That's what I want to try next," Brendon says. "Is that okay?"

"Tonight?" Spencer says, looking confused. "You still want to—-?"

"Yeah," Brendon says. "I know—look. I know you're just. I got a little weird, and I'm sorry, but that wasn't really your fault. I just suck at talking about this stuff unless I'm kidding around."

"That was totally my fault," Spencer says. "I was way too hard on you earlier. Brendon, don't apologize because _I_ was being a dick."

"They weren't complicated questions," Brendon says, shrugging. "I just. It's a thing. But I promise, we do this and if I don't like something, I'll say my safeword. But I really was okay that first time," Brendon continues, a little quieter. "I liked all of it."

"Okay," Spencer says, nodding a little. "You sure?"

"Yes," Brendon says. "Really fucking sure."

-

Spencer blindfolds him. Spencer had made him strip down to his underwear and then blindfolded him and now Brendon is tied up to Spencer's bed and he's already feeling that edge of restlessness, that strange sensation that will soon lead into that floating feeling that Brendon remembers so well. Right now, though. Right now Brendon is feeling really fucking helpless and he can't stop thinking about how Spencer's sheets are very soft, and how he's almost naked in Spencer's bed and Spencer is somewhere else in his house, planning out how he's going to hurt Brendon.

It's distracting.

Brendon tugs on his wrists again, trying to figure out his range of motion. His feet are free, but that won't really help him. He can't see anything at all. Spencer's blindfold is one of those huge ones, layers and layers of black fabric wrapped around his eyes and entirely blocking out his vision. Brendon thinks about what he must look like, and he shifts restlessly on the bed. He knows he's only here because Spencer doesn't want to ruin his nice expensive leather couch, but it still feels incredibly intimate. He thinks about Spencer standing at the edge of the bed, watching him, and he breathes nice and deep so he won't let out an accidental whimper.

He hears the click of Spencer's door opening, the drag of the bottom of the door against Spencer's carpets. He hears footsteps moving around the room, but he can't really figure out where Spencer is. It's like all of his senses have been heightened; he's straining to hear, to situate Spencer in space, but he can't. His stomach curls, low and warm. Brendon feels entirely helpless, but he's not scared.

There's the clink of something metal-on-metal, maybe some kind of utensil on the fondue pot. Brendon thinks about how he's never going to be able to eat fondue again without getting hard, and then he hears Spencer's voice, low and quiet and right next to his ear.

"You okay?" Spencer says. Brendon starts a little; Spencer's really close, closer than he was expecting.

"Yeah," Brendon breathes. "I'm okay."

"Good," Spencer says, and moves away. Brendon can feel the air moving around them, the slight rustle and hum of the air conditioner. "I'm not going to gag you this time," Spencer says conversationally. "I want to hear you."

"What about the neighbors?" Brendon manages. It's hard to keep up steady conversation. He's floating in space, dark and empty, and he forces himself to focus.

"If they can handle Resident Evil 2, they can handle this," Spencer says casually. "What's your safeword?"

"Beige," Brendon says.

"Good," Spencer says, and then Brendon feels a hand on his chest, right over his heart. He takes it as Spencer's signal that they're actually starting, that there won't be any more joking around. It's almost a relief. It really is becoming hard to focus. Brendon's mind feels like water, like he's sitting back and just watching his thoughts pass by. The restraints around his wrists are a constant reminder of how little control he has over this situation.

Brendon hears the sound of movement, and then there's a shifting of the mattress that tells him that Spencer is sitting somewhere near his feet. There's a weird crinkling noise, and then he feels Spencer lifting his feet up and slipping something underneath his heel. It feels like plastic—a shower curtain, or something, Brendon guesses—and Brendon tries to help by shifting his body into the motions, letting his legs go limp as Spencer carefully lifts him up, bit by bit. Brendon waits until the plastic is pressing against the backs of his thighs before arching up, lifting his hips off the bed. He can't really get very high—there's nothing to brace himself on—but he feels Spencer's hand on his hip, pressing into the curve of bone, squeezing him once before moving the plastic up underneath Brendon's back.

It's strange, how the sensation of lying on the shower curtain—or whatever it is—makes Brendon feel more exposed. He's laid out, and he's been laid out, and he's hard and he's blushing but everything's so hard to focus on he'd sort of forgotten about it. Now he feels like he's the center of attention, even if there's no one in the room but Spencer.

"Stay still," Spencer says. "Don't move unless I tell you to."

" 'kay," Brendon says. It comes out a little jumbled, a little slurred. Part of Brendon feels like he's going to fall asleep, and part of him just wants something to happen already. He's tired of waiting. He knows it's up to Spencer, that it's better if he just waits, but he's starting to get cold and seriously, what if he falls asleep like this, Spencer will never offer to do this again—

"Fuck!" Brendon yelps, as the first pour of wax hits his skin. "Fucking—fuck, ow, jesus _fuck_!" The wax is hot. The wax is motherfucking burning on his skin, and it hadn't been just a few drops, either—it feels like Spencer had just poured it on him, like with a ladle or something, and it's a thick line of fire all the way down his chest and over his stomach. Brendon's chest heaves. This doesn't feel anything like sticking his fingers in a candle.

"I said stay still," Spencer says, calmly. Brendon gasps for air, and Brendon can feel his finger tips trailing through the rapidly drying wax, one jagged edge of a fingernail pressing into his skin.

"It hurts," Brendon chokes out, and then feels sort of dumb, because of course it hurts, that's the point. Spencer had told him it was going to hurt. Spencer had tried it out on himself and he knows what he's doing and Brendon still can't get over just how much it hurt for those few brief seconds.

"I know it does," Spencer says softly, and then there's another line, another pool of fire spreading out over his stomach. Brendon grits his teeth and throws his head back. He wants to arch up into the sensation—he doesn't know why—but Spencer told him to stay still. He has to stay still.

Each time the wax touches his skin, Brendon can feel the edges of something brighter, something sharp and far-away, even through the sting. He loses track of time. It feels like Spencer is making some kind of cross-hatching pattern, but he can't even tell, really. It's just Brendon saying "Fuck, fuck" over and over again, and those stinging moments of pain, and the way his nerves keep crying out and the way he's still really hard. He can't see anything. Every time Spencer finds a new place to pour the wax—the top of his ankle, the crook of his elbow, right on his hip-bone—Brendon sees a dull flash of red behind his eyelids. He wonders if the wax itself is colored. The stuff in the bottom of the fondue pot had been a thick milky-white. Brendon wonders what he must look like—messy, flushed, covered in white lines. Oh, god.

He feels Spencer moving around again, and then there's a hand on his stomach, smoothing over the patches. It feels weird. Brendon can't feel Spencer's hand when he's touching the wax, so it's a pitter-patter of sensation. It makes him feel like he's not sure where his body is, like his head is floating somewhere else and his body is very far away.

Spencer is talking. Brendon raises his head slightly, as though that will make it easier to figure out what Spencer is staying. He knows that Spencer's saying something, and he recognizes the words, but his brain can't seem to figure out any more of that.

"Brendon," Spencer says, and pinches Brendon's thigh. Brendon twitches. "Brendon. Focus on my voice, okay? Focus on this spot." He pinches again, three times, and it's a little jolt to Brendon's brain each time, anchoring him in place. Brendon draws in a deep breath, and okay. Yeah. He's not floating in space. He's here, with Spencer.

"You're being so good," Spencer says, his voice full of pride, and Brendon feels a warm senesation somewhere deep inside. "You're being so still, you stayed so still, but now I want you to move for me."

" 'kay," Brendon murmurs. He concentrates and manages to move one ankle, letting it flop over to the side. The wax cracks a little when he does it; Brendon can feel it pulling on the fine hairs. He wonders how the hell he's going to get all this wax off, but it's a fleeting thought, one that doesn't take hold. Spencer will figure it out. He trusts Spencer to have a plan.

"Like this," Spencer says, and runs his palm up Brendon's thigh, underneath his ass to the small of Brendon's back. He pushes up, and Brendon struggles to follow. He can kind of do it as long as Spencer holds him up; he can brace his feet on the mattress and bend his knees and keep his elbows pushed into the headboard.

"Stay like that," Spencer says. He takes his hand away, and Brendon tries to focus. He can feel his leg muscles starting to tremble, but he ignores it. He locks his knees and holds the position, and he can feel Spencer brushing the tips of his fingers up his chest, into the hollow of his collarbone. The fingers travel up to his face, and rest on his lips, and Brendon can't help it—he knows he's not supposed to, he knows he's going to get in trouble, but he pushes up just once, just enough so that he can press his lips to the tip of Spencer's fingers. Brendon wants to lick them, wants to suck them into his mouth but he can't, no. He can't do that. He's breaking the rules already.

"Hmmm," Spencer says, and Brendon thinks he hears a smile in his voice. Brendon swallows, and then Spencer's gripping his jaw, forcing his head farther back. It changes the angle he's holding his body at, and Brendon struggles to keep himself up. Spencer digs the fingers of his other hand into Brendon's stomach, and oh, god, Brendon's going to fall over. His torso is trying to curl in against the pain, but he's supposed to be keeping himself arched out, and shit—shit—

"Good boy," Spencer says, and takes his hand off Brendon's jaw. He drags a fingernail down the curve, pressing in, and Brendon can hear himself whimpering, as if from far away. His entire body is trembling. Brendon takes a deep breath and arches out, farther, farther, into the strange sensation of Spencer's fingers clawed into his belly, and then Spencer is holding him again, strong fingers pressed to his lower back, and Brendon sags into the support. His shoulders are screaming at him but it's okay, he thinks, it's okay because Spencer is holding him up. He can stay like this as long as he has to, if Spencer's hands are supporting him.

Spencer's other hand—-the one on his belly—releases, rubbing carefully at the marks before moving away. Brendon's still hard. There's wax on the band of his briefs, cracking along the area where fabric meets skin, and Brendon wonders what it would feel like if Spencer took his underwear off entirely, if he held Brendon up like this and made him arch up into the wax as he dripped it down the thin skin of his inner thigh. Brendon feels his dick jerk at the thought, but he can't even—he's too far gone to be ashamed. Spencer's still touching him, and Spencer's still holding him up, and that's all that matters. If Brendon had really done something wrong, Spencer would be punishing him by now.

Another ladle-full, right on his stomach. Brendon hisses through his teeth. The wax runs down his sides, and Brendon presses up into the sensation, farther, farther. Somewhere, his muscles are aching. His thighs. Yes. Brendon's thighs hurt, but it takes him a long minute to figure out why, and then there's another splash of wax to deal with, hot and sharp and painful. And then—

"Hnngngh," Brendon gasps out. It feels like—it can't be wax, because it's hard, and it's melting where it touches his skin, but it feels like the same sensation, the same _toomuch, toomuch._ Spencer presses it deeper into his skin, pushing against the friction.

"Do you know what this is?" Spencer asks. Brendon tosses his head back and forth. "No," Brendon gasps out. "What—no."

"It's ice," Spencer says, and there's a smile in his voice. "What does it feel like?"

"Hot," Brendon whines. "It's—fuck, burns. It's burning."

"I thought so," Spencer says, conversationally. His voice sounds a little breathier than normal. It curls around the consonents with a slight growl. "I read about this happening, but I've never seen it." Brendon whines. "Do you like it?"

"Yes," Brendon says, before he's thought about it. "Yes, more, come on, please,"

"Greedy," Spencer says, slapping him lightly on the thigh. "You'll have to ask much more nicely than that."

"Please," Brendon says, whimpering a little as Spencer starts slowly pushing on his hip, lowering him back down. His muscles unlock, and then suddenly it's a huge fucking surge of endorphins, and Brendon's so overwhelmed he can't even breathe for a moment. It's like coming, only he's not coming, or he doesn't think he is, but it feels the same, somehow.

"Tell me what it feels like," Spencer whispers, and Brendon moans. "I—-fuck," Brendon gasps out. "Can't." He can hear himself making a high noise, almost like a squeal.

"Tell me," Spencer presses, his voice firmer. "Something just happened to you, something good, and I want you to tell me about it. Do you think I can't see?" Spencer says, and drags his fingers down Brendon's thigh. "Your whole body just shook."

"Feels like—coming," Brendon moans, and then there's a surge of _shitshitshit_ because no, he's not supposed to talk about that. Brendon feels his cheeks heat further. But he just—there's nothing else to say, no other way to describe it, and Spencer sucks in a surprised breath at his words.

"Yeah?" Spencer says, and he sounds even more fascinated, his voice low and thick.

"Please," Brendon whimpers. He can feel everything trembling a little, even when he tries to hold himself still. He barely enough knows what he's saying.

"No," Spencer says, "Shhh, okay. You're okay. But I think you're done for right now."

"Please," Brendon says. He focuses all of his energy—what little he has—and kicks his foot out, weakly knocking it against Spencer's thigh. Spencer grabs it, and then smooths his thumb over his instep, holding it in both hands. Brendon sucks in a breath, and then lets it out in a _whoosh_. Spencer said no. Spencer said no, and it's the last thing Brendon wants, but that's okay. Brendon needs to listen to Spencer.

"Shh," Spencer says. His voice is so, so gentle, so awed. "It's okay, Brendon. I'm here. I've got you."

-

Brendon floats for a while. He feels Spencer untying the blindfold, freeing his hands, and they flop down on his chest when they're finally free. Spencer picks them up, one by one, rubbing the feeling back into them. It's a pins-and-needles sensation, but Brendon's too far gone to shy away from the touch. He lets himself drift.

He comes to when Spencer starts moving away, sitting back on his heels. "I need you to sit up," Spencer says gently. "We're going to go into the bathroom, okay? I'm right here."

" 'kay," Brendon slurs. He tries to sit up, and mostly fails, but Spencer's got an arm around his shoulders and he tugs until Brendon's mostly upright. Brendon lets himself be moved. Spencer's careful with him, but he's firm, and he moves Brendon's limbs for him when they don't go exactly where they're supposed to.

The first time Brendon stands up, he gets an insane head rush. He wobbles a little bit, but Spencer's right there, holding him close to his body. Spencer's kind of sweaty, actually, but that's okay. "Just lean on me," Spencer says. "We're going to do this really slow."

They fumble their way into the bathroom. Spencer gets Brendon seated on the edge of the tub, and then he rummages around under the sink until he comes back with a bottle of something.

"I'm going to sit in there with you and lean back up against the tub," Spencer says, shucking his jeans and tossing them in the corner. "I want you to just lean back up against me. You don't have to do anything. I'll do everything for you. Just keep your eyes open."

"Mmm," Brendon says. He waits until Spencer's unhooked his shower head—he's got one of those fancy ones that's on a cord, that you can move around—and then he tries to stumble into the tub but he's still not very good at moving.

"Okay, okay," Spencer says, and guides him down. Brendon flops heavily back against Spencer's chest. Spencer's so warm. Brendon shouldn't be cold, but he is. He just wants to hold on to Spencer and never let go.

"I'm going to put this stuff on you," Spencer says quietly, reaching for the bottle. "It's just baby oil. I'm going to rub it into your skin and then I'm going to turn the water on and heat it up really slowly, okay? I don't want you to go into temperature shock. It's just going to be kind of lukewarm for a while, and then it's going to be warm, and then the wax is going to get a little mushy and we can rub it off your skin."

"Mmm," Brendon says again. He appreciates that Spencer's narrating everything to him, but he's pretty sure he's not even capable of protesting. Whatever Spencer wants to do right now is okay. As long as he doesn't leave Brendon, it's all good. His hands feel nice on Brendon's skin. They're warm and slippery, and Spencer takes his time, rubbing the oil into the places where the wax is cracking on Brendon's skin. Brendon thinks this should probably feel weirder than it does—him and Spencer, mostly naked in a bathtub, Spencer cradling him against his chest—but it just feels right. It feels like this is supposed to happen.

"Alright," Spencer says, after another long while, another indeterminate time in which Brendon had started sort of drifting again. "Water now. Tell me if it feels weird, okay? Tell me if you start getting nauseous, or if it doesn't feel good."

"You're good at this," Brendon slurs. He lets his head loll back against Spencer's shoulder. "S'good."

"You deserve it," Spencer says. He runs one hand through Brendon's hair, brushing it off his forehead. It feels sweaty. Brendon doesn't remember sweating that much, but he was kind of distracted. "You did so good, Brendon. So good. You were amazing."

"Mmmph," Brendon says happily. He smiles to himself. It's kind of a dopey grin, too big and too wide, but he can't seem to make it go away once it's there. The water swishes on his skin, pleasantly warm. He feels Spencer's fingers working at the wax, peeling it off in strips and carefully working his fingernails underneath the more recalcitrant chunks. When he looks down, there's a pattern of red marks all down his stomach, strips of red skin that feel sensitive to the touch, but don't actually hurt.

Spencer sees him looking, and pauses for a moment, smoothing his hand down Brendon's chest. "You looked beautiful," Spencer says quietly, and Brendon feels something large and thick in his chest. He swallows. For a stupid, absurd moment, he feels like he's going to cry.

"Hey—shit," Spencer says, noticing how Brendon has suddenly gone still. "Wait. No, I'm—-Brendon, Brendon. I'm sorry. I'm just talking, you don't have to listen to me. I'm still—I shouldn't have said that. Hey."

"No," Brendon says, unable to explain. He doesn't know how to translate into words what Spencer makes him feel. "No, I just. It's okay." He takes a deep breath. "I want that."

"Oh," Spencer says softly. "You do?"

"I want to be—-that," Brendon says, and closes his eyes. It feels like he's giving up another secret. He wonders how many of them are going to slip out if they keep doing this. "For you," Brendon says, barely audible.

"Oh," Spencer says. He pulls Brendon in tighter, and they stay there, not speaking, for a long time.

-

"Do you want to stay here tonight?" Spencer says, as they're stepping out. He's dripping on the floor, because his boxers are absolutely soaked, but he makes no move to shuck them or dry himself off.

"I—oh," Brendon says. His immediate impulse is to say yes, to curl himself into Spencer and never let go, but the more he comes back to himself the more he realizes that something just happened between them, and he's not sure how to deal with it.

"I'd, um." Spencer says. He turns to the towel rack, grabs one, and then pushes it at Brendon. Brendon takes it. "I'd really like it if you stayed here."

"Okay," Brendon says. He takes a deep breath. "Won't I get shit all over your couch, though?" His skin is still faintly shiny, covered in the last traces of the oil. Spencer had poured some of his fancy body-wash stuff into a facecloth and wiped Brendon down, but there's still a lot of it left on his skin.

"I was thinking, we could just—" Spencer says. He flaps his hands a little. "Do you mind just sharing with me? I'll wash my sheets later."

Brendon opens and then closes his mouth. "Okay," Brendon says, after a moment. "Yeah. Okay."

-

Spencer holds on to him all night, long after he's fallen asleep. Brendon's so tired, and everything in his body feels simultaneously sore and relaxed, but he can't seem to sleep. It's like the exact opposite of last time, where he'd passed out immediately and Spencer had gone out for a swim. Spencer's warm around him, breathing steadily and lightly, and every time Brendon shifts a little Spencer follows him.

It feels—nice. It feels too nice, and Brendon likes it too much, and he's rapidly starting to realize that he's totally fucked. He's shared a bed with Spencer before, but never like this—skin to skin, feet tangled up, the smell of Spencer's hair and his skin. Brendon wants to roll over and climb on top of Spencer and kiss him until he can't breathe, until they're panting and clawing at each other. He wants to pull down Spencer's shorts and take him in his mouth and feel Spencer's hands in his hair, on his jaw, forcing him open and telling Brendon how fast and how far. Brendon wants it in a way he's never experienced—more concrete, more physical, not just idle fantasies. He wants Spencer to hold him down and fuck him—like, seriously, Brendon wants Spencer to put his dick inside of him—and that's when he realizes he needs to leave before he completely loses his shit.

Brendon carefully disentangles himself from Spencer, shoving a pillow into Spencer's arms when Spencer makes a sleepy, confused noise and reaches out to pull Brendon back in. Brendon sits on the edge of the bed and lets his head drop until it's between his knees. He breathes for a while, and then he gets up and steals Spencer's car keys and gets into Spencer's car and drives himself home.

-

He texts Spencer in the morning, so he won't think someone's stolen his car. Brendon doesn't know what to say—"I needed some space because I just realized I have a huge thing for you"? "Sorry I stole your car, I couldn't stop thinking about what it would be like if we fucked"?—so he just writes _will bring car back tomorrow sorry._ He gets a text from Spencer a few hours later that just says, _okay._ Brendon doesn't know what that means, so he doesn't respond. He calls Ryan instead.

"What are you doing?" Brendon says, when Ryan picks up.

"What are _you_ doing?" Ryan says.

"You first," Brendon says, tapping his fingers on the countertop. He's still fucking restless. He slept like shit last night, and now he's all overtired and weird.

"I'm at Target," Ryan says distractedly. "I need things for my house."

"What kind of things?" Brendon says, standing up and toeing his shoes on.

"Uh," Ryan says. "Well. I realized when I got home that I never bought like, wastebaskets. So I need some of those. Oh, hey. Holy shit. Did you know they made bath towels with flamingos on them?"

"What color flamingos?" Brendon says. "Also I'm coming along to supervise. Which one are you at?"

"The one near my place," Ryan says. "You know, that big one near the highway. And pink flamingos, duh. What the fuck other color would they be?"

"You don't need pink flamingo towels," Brendon says. "And I'll be there in like, twenty. Wait for me, okay?"

"Oooh, tropical fish," Ryan says. "Oh man. What about towels with fish on them?"

"No," Brendon says.

"I'm buying them," Ryan says, and he hangs up on Brendon. Brendon shakes his head at his phone, and then walks out to his car.

-

Ryan's tropical fish towels are the ugliest thing Brendon's ever seen. They're like, stupid looking fish with overly-excited smiles swimming around on a puke-green background. Ryan loves them. Brendon tries to distract him, because he can see more fish-themed accessories at the end of the aisle, but it's a lost cause.

"Oh my god," Ryan says, darting around Brendon and leaving his shopping cart directly in the middle of the aisle. "It's a soap dispenser."

"Dammit," Brendon says.

"It comes out of his mouth," Ryan says wonderingly. "The soap. Comes out of his mouth!"

"How many joints did you smoke in the parking lot," Brendon says, because he's spent too much time with Ryan Ross not to recognize that tone. Also, he kind of smells like weed.

"Two," Ryan says. "Fish. Dispenser!"

"Get it," Brendon sighs, and pushes the cart over towards Ryan. "Just get it. Get all of it. We can go home and pack your bong and then redecorate your bathroom."

"Awesome," Ryan agrees solemnly. He pats the fish soap dispenser gently on its head, and then places it in the cart.

-

Brendon spends the next two days hanging out with Ryan and avoiding Spencer. He still hasn't managed to see his parents. It's like he can't get up the emotional energy to see them, as much as he misses them. He knows he's probably hurting his mom's feelings, but all Brendon really wants to do is sit around Ryan's condo and get high with Ryan and watch stupid shit on TV. Brendon doesn't want to pretend to be a good son and he doesn't want to deal with the whole Spencer thing and so he sits around with Ryan and they watch a whole bunch of movies about French people and also one about the Black Plague or something.

("It's a fucking classic," Ryan hisses, annoyed and more than a little stoned. "I can't believe you've never—how are you such a heathen?"

"Why are they on a beach?" Brendon says. He burps, and then he thinks that maybe he should remove the pizza box from his stomach, because otherwise he's just going to keep eating. "Is this seriously all in Swedish? Who the fuck makes a movie in Swedish?"

"Swedish people," Ryan says, his mouth compressing into a thin line. "Brilliant Swedish directors who understand the sadness and futility of life in the face of a silent God."

"Holy shit, that was a dead guy!" Brendon says, pointing at the screen. The guy who is following the guy on horseback is kicking at some dude lying on the ground, and then he recoils back. The camera zooms in to a close-up. "That was—that guy's face was so fucked up!"

"It got eaten by rats," Ryan says. "That's what happens when you died in the middle ages. Rats ate you."

"Awesome," Brendon says.)

Avoiding Spencer works really well until Brendon drives himself home on Thursday afternoon to find Spencer sitting on his front stoop, drinking something in a Starbucks cup and smoking a clove.

"Uh," Brendon says, after he parks his car in the driveway and walks over to Spencer. "Hey?"

"Hey," Spencer says, squinting up at him. "I came to get my car back. Also we have to go have dinner at my mom's."

"Oh," Brendon says. Then, "I thought you didn't smoke anymore." There was a period of time when they'd all smoked, in a haphazard sort of fashion, but Spencer had never really taken to it. He'd never liked the smell of cigarettes, and even when he smoked cloves, Brendon knew he didn't really inhale.

Spencer shrugs. "Bought a pack," he says, fumbling in his pocket. "Want one? I'm never going to finish them all."

"Sure," Brendon says, after a beat. He sits down, and accepts the clove that Spencer offers him. They're Djarum Specials. He fishes a lighter out of his pocket and inhales deeply after it's lit. He knows he's not supposed to, but Brendon likes the taste and it's been a while since he smoked anything that wasn't weed.

"How did you get over here, anyway?" Brendon says.

"I took a cab," Spencer says.

"Huh," Brendon says. He feels kind of bad, all of a sudden. He wonders if Spencer's been avoiding him and just taking cabs everywhere so he wouldn't have to bother Brendon. The thought makes him feel really shitty. He hadn't really considered anything other than himself at the time.

"Are you okay?" Spencer says, into the strained silence.

"Yeah," Brendon says. He stares straight ahead, and doesn't look at Spencer. Spencer looks like he hasn't been sleeping much. He's a little red around the eyes, and his hair is a mess in the back. He's wearing an old t-shirt and slightly faded jeans and flip-flops.

"Was it too much?" Spencer says. "It was too much, wasn't it. I'm. Shit."

"No," Brendon says, after a minute. He inhales again, and wishes he was anywhere but here. "It was okay."

"Okay," Spencer says. "Right. Okay."

-

Dinner at Spencer's mom's house is weird. Every time Brendon gets too close to Spencer he gets a whiff of his shampoo, of his skin, and then he's reminded about how much he just wants to get down on his knees for Spencer and it's fucking with his head. Spencer's parents are like, right there, and Jackie and Crystal are setting the table and Spencer's teasing Crystal about her new boyfriend and Brendon feels like a huge pervert.

"I'm going to bring Zack to his house," Spencer says, with a completely straight face. "And we're going to just like, sit under his window and stare at him."

"You are not," Crystal says. "You're such a dick, no you won't."

"He has to know what's going to happen," Spencer says, shrugging. "I'll tell Zack to bring his hunting knife. No one fucks with my little sister, Crys. Especially not some punk-ass high school kid."

"Leave your sister alone," Ginger says, rolling her eyes. "You were a 'punk-ass high school kid' a few years ago." She makes the fake quotation marks in the air while she says it. It's adorable. Brendon loves Ginger.

"Yeah, and then I got famous," Spencer says, pulling out a chair. "What's the point of being famous if you can't threaten people with your bodyguard?" He looks over at Brendon, and motions him towards the chair. Brendon goes without thinking, and then there's a weird moment where all of a sudden Spencer realizes that he's just pulled Brendon's chair out for him, and Brendon realizes that he was just about to let him, and then they stare at each other, wide-eyed, in awkward silence.

"Uh," Brendon says, and then he gives up and sits down.

Spencer pulls his own chair out, and sits down next to him.

-

"How long until you're back home?" Ginger says, fussing over Spencer's hair while they're standing in the entranceway. Brendon's loaded up with leftovers, because Ginger is one of those moms who makes too much on purpose so then you have no choice but to bring some home. She's really sneaky that way. "Where in Europe are you going this time? North? South?"

"North again," Brendon says. "Mostly. Uh. Germany, England, France. I think—are we going to Norway? We are, aren't we."

"Yeah," Spencer says, nodding. "Think so. It's going to be cool. Ryan's really excited about seeing a fjord."

"I'm so proud of you," Ginger says softly. She's giving Spencer one of those mom-looks, like she's seeing the tiny boy she raised instead of the slightly unshaven young man standing in front of her and ducking his head. She leans in and hugs him tightly. Spencer hugs her back, holding on. Brendon thinks about how he really needs to go see his mom. "Seriously though, when are you coming back?"

"July 15th," Spencer says. "I'll be back really soon. It's not a long tour."

"And then you're doing Asia for most of August?" Ginger says. She shakes her head. "Promise me you'll actually get some sleep this time. And don't drink too much."

" _Mom_ ," Spencer says, reddening.

"I've seen your dressing rooms," Ginger says, shaking her head. "Like it matters that you're not twenty-one until September. Don't throw up on anyone, okay?"

"Yeah, Spence," Brendon says. "Don't throw up on me." Spencer rolls his eyes. Ginger snorts, and leans in to hug Brendon tightly. "Keep an eye on him for me," she says softly, too quiet for Spencer to hear. Brendon nods without thinking.

-

They fly out to New Jersey Friday morning. Everyone's meeting at Newark, and from there they're all heading over to Germany. Brendon still hasn't seen his parents. He figures he'll see them the next time he's home. It's only another month, after all.

He gets drunk with Spencer and Ryan in the preflight lounge while they're waiting for Jon to fly to in from Chicago. It's barely noon, but Brendon's going to be spending the better part of the next twenty-four hours traveling. Shane's meeting them in Germany after the first show. Brendon really wishes Shane was here. He feels itchy with the need to talk to someone about Spencer. Normally he's not really in the habit of having long heart-to-hearts with Shane about his relationship issues, but there's no one else to talk to who isn't in his band.

"I'm going to need another one of those," Ryan says, swirling the remains of his frozen cocktail around in the glass. "These are really good." His drink is bright really pink and fruity. Brendon can smell the Malibu from where he's sitting. He's having a Yuengling, because they're close enough to Pennsylvania to have them here. Spencer's drinking a Guinness.

"You're going to throw up on the plane," Spencer says. "Don't do that. How much rum does that have in it, anyway?"

"No idea," Ryan says. He takes another sip. "Is it good or bad if I can't taste it?"

"Bad," Brendon and Spencer say, in unison. Spencer slants a smile at him, and Brendon finds himself smiling back before he remembers that shit is weird between them.

"Hmm," Ryan says. He shrugs, and then calls the waiter over and orders another one anyway.

-

The flight is long, and boring. Brendon's sitting next to Jon, who is sitting next to Ryan, who is sitting next to Spencer, who is sitting next to Zack. They're all in one row across the middle of the big 747. Brendon's really psyched about his aisle seat. Normally he has to like, trade with someone else and promise them his firstborn child and then get extorted all tour. Ryan makes big sad eyes at him, and Brendon shakes his head. "No fucking way," Brendon says, before Ryan can even open his mouth. "No. I don't care what you're offering."

"I drank too much," Ryan says. "I'm going to have to get up and piss like, eighty times. Come on. I'll buy you a case of Red Bull."

"Nope," Brendon says. He wiggles his toes a little in his shoes. He's got his feet kicked out to the side, because he can. "Pee on Spencer."

"Don't you dare," Spencer mumbles. He's already got his sweatshirt over his eyes and his travel pillow on the back of the seat. "I will actually kill you if you pee on me."

"Seconded," Jon says. He's flipping through the in-flight magazine. "Switch with Zack if you're so desperate."

"Nope," Zack says. "I have to be here in case of an emergency. So if the plane goes down in flames, I can pick you all you little dudes up and throw you overboard."

"...So we can drown?" Ryan says, frowning at Zack.

"Not my problem," Zack says, shrugging. "Just make sure you grab your life preserver before I throw you overboard."

"I hate flying with you guys," Jon says, shaking his head.

-

They touch down in Munich around 2 AM. They're way in the back of the plane, and by the time they all manage to stumble off and spill out into the terminal, it's almost empty. The airport is silent around them. All the shops are closed up for the night. Brendon yawns and rubs at his eyes.

"This way," Zack says, after staring at a large sign for a really long time. "I think. I'm pretty sure it's this way."

"Okay," Brendon nods. He wonders how long they're going to get to sleep at the hotel. He knows they have some interviews tomorrow, and maybe some kind of fan-meet-up, but other than that he's kind of flying blind. He probably should have actually read the schedule while he was on the plane.

They catch up to the last of the other passengers in the baggage terminal. It's almost empty of both passengers and luggage. Brendon can see their luggage going around the carousel in a big pile, a jumble of backpacks and suitcases and that one guitar that Ryan refused to ship with their other gear. He looks over at Jon, and raises one eyebrow.

"Yeah?" Brendon says.

Jon looks at him for a moment. Brendon looks pointedly at the baggage carousel.

"Oh, hell yes," Jon says, starting to grin. "Ready? On three. One—two—-"

"Oh fuck no," Zack says, his eyes widening. "No. Guys. We're in Germany, that's not—"

"THREE," Jon and Brendon yell out, in unison, and then they both make a mad dash for their luggage. Brendon makes it to the conveyor belt first, scrambling over and up the ramp where the luggage comes out. "First one to get their bag back to base wins!" Jon calls, hopping on the conveyor belt just behind Brendon.

"Where's base?" Brendon yells back, feinting one way and then stumbling the opposite way, against the motion of the belt. The trick to this game is not getting tagged before you make it back to base, and Jon's a master at sneaking up on you and making you lose.

"Spencer," Jon calls back, snagging the strap of his backpack off the belt and jumping back from Brendon's hands.

"Shit!" Brendon calls out, laughing. "Shit, no fair—"

"I'm not the base," Spencer calls out, slumping down in a chair against the wall. "Ryan's base, I forfeit."

"You're going to get arrested," Zack growls. "Seriously, guys, this is Germany, they get really cranky when you—oh, fuck." He sighs, and then walks over and tugs Brendon off the conveyor belt, dragging him over to Spencer with one hand on his collar.

"Stay," Zack growls, and then goes to save Jon from the two very angry airport policemen who are yelling at him in German.

-

Germany is fun, when Brendon's not too tired to appreciate it. The food is good, and so is the beer. They're really busy, and no one manages to get a full night's sleep until after they touch down in Norway.

"You have twelve hours," Zack says, once they get dropped off at their hotel. "I expect you to spend ten of those hours sleeping. If I have to come in there and put you all to bed like some creepy tattooed nanny, I _will_."

"But I want to see fjords," Ryan says, frowning. "What if we like, go get a cab to somewhere and I promise to sleep in the cab?"

"No," Zack says. "It's 5am. You are not going to see a fjord at 5am. Go to bed."

"Dammit," Ryan says. Spencer ruffles his hair, and yawns a little. "I'll set my alarm for noon," Spencer says, blinking tiredly. "We'll get up and find some fjords, Ry."

"Okay," Ryan says, easily placated. "Promise?"

"Yeah," Spencer says. He reaches out to grab his keycard from Zack, and then follows Ryan into the elevator. Brendon follows suit. He's mostly rooming with Jon again, with Shane staying with them when they can get a bigger room.

Brendon wants to assume that's just the way it worked out, but he doesn't really know that for certain. It's been a strange couple of days. He and Spencer are fine when they're in the group, but once it's just the two of them, Brendon never knows what to say. Spencer's pretty quiet around him, like he's afraid Brendon's going to crack. Sometimes they forget for a little while, slipping back easily into old habits, but then there's always that awkward moment where Spencer will stiffen and move away and Brendon will feel that catch in the back of his throat that means he's really fucking upset about something and just repressing it.

It sucks, honestly, but Brendon's trying not to think about it.

Jon calls Cassie when they get up to their room, because it's only about 10pm in Chicago. Brendon flops down on his bed and listens to the soft drone of Jon's voice. He sounds tired, and kind of sad, and Brendon rolls over and shoves the pillow over his head because he doesn't think he can handle someone else's sadness right now. He's been doing okay, but he's exhausted and he's kind of lonely and it feels like the gap between him and Spencer is just getting wider and wider. It's all Brendon's fault, but he knows he can't apologize without fucking things up more.

"No, hey," Jon says softly, curling in towards his phone. "Hey, Cass. It's okay. I'll see you in two weeks, right? You're going to love France, I promise. We'll run away from the guys and go sit somewhere and drink wine in the sunshine. It's going to be great."

Brendon presses his face into the mattress and lets out a sigh.

-

Ryan takes like sixty thousand pictures of him and Spencer and Zack in front of the fjord. He shows them to Brendon on his camera on their way over to the venue. Brendon pauses on one of Spencer for a long time, way longer than he can really explain. Spencer's laughing, his mouth open and his hand blurred, like he was trying to tell Ryan not to take the picture. His hair's blowing in the wind, catching on his eyelashes.

He looks really happy.

Brendon swallows and hands the camera back to Ryan.


	4. Chapter 4

_This is stupid,_ the email says. _I'm sorry. I know I fucked up and this is really stupid and I'm sick of not being able to hang out with you. Tell me what I need to do to fix this._

"Fuck," Brendon says. He presses the heel of his hands to his eye sockets. Fuck Fuck Fuck. He still doesn't know what to say to Spencer. His stomach hurts just thinking about it, and then it hurts more when he thinks about how Spencer is totally blaming himself for all of this when he didn't even do anything wrong.

 _you didn't fuck up_ , Brendon sends back, after a long moment of just staring at his screen. _You gave me what I wanted. I just need some time off. But I'm sick of stuff being weird between us too. It's dumb. I'm sorry._

-

"I need to tell you something," Brendon says, fiddling with his spoon. "Like, I realize this is fucking weird, and I'm probably just going to ramble for a while but if I don't tell someone I'm seriously going to go insane and I know you don't want that to happen. At least I think you don't."

"You're pregnant, aren't you," Shane says, leaning back in his chair. "Can I be the godfather?"

"No," Brendon says. He takes a deep breath. He's gone to all the fucking trouble of sneaking Shane away from everyone else; he can't chicken out now.

As usual, it comes out all wrong.

"I want to fuck Spencer," Brendon blurts out, and then groans and hides his face in his hands.

"Whoa," Shane says. There's silence for a long moment. Brendon gathers up his courage, and lifts his head. Shane's just sort of staring at him. He looks completely confused.

"That is," Shane says. "Thats. Probably the last thing I thought you were going to say."

"What did you think I was going to say?" Brendon says. "You really thought I got someone pregnant?"

"I figured it was like, man-to-man bonding time," Shane says. "Not that this isn't! I just mean. Wow. Okay."

"I can explain," Brendon says, a little weakly.

"Uh," Shane says. "No. That's okay. It seems kind of self-explanatory to me."

"No, it's—look, I don't want to weird you out, I'm not going into details, but it turns out that Spencer is into some interesting shit, and so am I, and it's not like—not _sexual_ interesting shit! I mean it can be, but we're not, except somehow it got really complicated and he said some stuff and then I said some stuff and then he wanted me to sleep in his bed, and then I freaked out because I liked it too much, and then I stole his car and then we saw his mom and she told me to take care of him and like—fuck, Shane, I just don't know what to do."

Shane blinks at him.

"Can we do that again?" Shane says, after a moment. "Maybe slower this time. And in chronological order. And what the hell, why did you steal his car?"

"It's complicated," Brendon says, wincing. "Look, the point is, I think I like him, right? Like I like him in the way that I actually want to get naked with him. And not just like, think about getting naked with him. There would be dicks involved."

"Uh-huh," Shane says.

"I can't get naked with Spencer," Brendon says, even though he feels like that must be pretty obvious. "He's in my band."

"Does he...want to get naked with you?" Shane says, carefully. He still looks a little shell-shocked.

"I have no idea," Brendon says. "No. I don't think so. I have no idea."

"Maybe you should work that one out first," Shane says.

-

"He really used a fondue pot?" Shane says. "Wait. Can I like—you don't think he'd let me film you guys, do you?"

"I need to be way drunker if we're going to continue this conversation, " Brendon says.

-

Brendon wakes up to the sound of Jon's alarm blaring, and a headache the size of a small moon.

"Uhhh," Brendon groans, sad and pitiful. Jon pokes him in the foot as he's walking over to his suitcase.

"You were soooo drunk last night," Jon sing-songs, giggling to himself a little. "So drunk, Bden. Shane was practically carrying you."

"Ugh," Brendon agrees. His mouth tastes like death. His eyes won't stop watering. He wonders if maybe he can just burrow under the covers and pretend he doesn't exist. His stomach churns.

"Bus call is in thirty," Jon says cheerfully. "I'm going to go get breakfast. I'm thinking eggs. Eggs, and maybe pancakes, and coffee, and orange juice—-"

Brendon sits up, shoves Jon out of the way, and barely makes it to the bathroom in time.

"See you at the bus!" Jon calls through the door, cackling to himself. Brendon leans up against the side of the toilet and thinks about how everyone in his band is an asshole.

-

That entire morning is absolute hell. Brendon's so hungover he can't keep anything except water down, and they've got a four-hour drive over bumpy European highways before they're scheduled to be somewhere. The bus they're traveling on is small and cramped, and Brendon's bunk contains about six cubic inches of space. He can't even stretch his legs out all the way.

It's on one of his frequent trips back and forth to the tiny bathroom that he sees Spencer stretched out in the tiny back lounge. He's watching something on Ryan's portable DVD player with his headphones on. He's smiling at the screen, and his hair is still damp from his shower and all Brendon wants right then and there is to curl up with Spencer and forget about how miserable he feels.

He crosses the room before he can think about it too much. Spencer looks up in surprise when he sees Brendon coming towards them, and then Brendon sort of launches himself into Spencer's side. He buries himself in Spencer's shoulder, curling his knees up to his stomach because it's still lurching around unhappily.

He feels Spencer stiffen and start to move away, but Brendon just hugs him tighter. God, seriously, his entire head is throbbing. "I'm really sorry," Brendon mumbles, into Spencer's shoulder. "I'm sorry I left and I'm sorry I was such a dick about it and I'm sorry I stole your car. And I'm sorry I made you think that you did something wrong. You didn't do anything wrong."

Spencer blinks at him.

"I really need a hug," Brendon whispers sadly. "I'm not just saying I'm sorry because of that, but even if you're still mad at me, I kind of need one." Brendon holds his breath and thinks that he's absolutely going to deserve it if Spencer tells him to fuck off, but then he feels Spencer's shoulders relax. Spencer sighs, and wiggles one arm out from in-between them so he can wrap it around Brendon.

"You smell really bad," Spencer informs him solemnly. "Like, I can smell the day-old vodka from here."

"I know," Brendon says sadly.

"You're really lucky I like you," Spencer says, shaking his head, but he holds Brendon close and lets Brendon burrow into his side. Brendon holds on as tightly as he can without feeling like he's going to hurl on Spencer.

-

It's always weird to pop back into England when they're touring in Europe. Brendon gets really used to not understanding what everyone around him is saying, and to things like street signs and billboards being meaningless, and then when he's back where everyone speaks English his brain gets all confused again.

They're playing Glastonbury for the first time. Brendon's played England a lot since that one time in Reading, and they've played other festivals, but sometimes he still gets a little gun-shy about going on stage. It's hard to psych yourself up when the possibility of broken glass flying at your head is a very real one.

"Hey," Spencer says, nudging him. "You want to wander around? We can take Zack. Jon and Ryan said they want to just hang out back here in the shade."

"Sure," Brendon says. They're the only FBR act playing at Glastonbury so they don't know many people, but it's actually rather refreshing. They can just go, and listen to the music, and chill out without people screaming for them. Brendon knows there's at least three or four bands that Spencer is dead-set on seeing.

They've got all those little corridors set up, the ones that are zip-lined off for techs and musicians and celebrities so they can move through the crowd easily. They have to stop for a few autographs, and a few pictures, but eventually they make it down to the indie stages. Brendon doesn't want to make it a big deal, but they end up watching almost every act from the side of the stage anyway. He sees some of the smaller acts looking over at them and pointing. He thinks about it for a minute, takes another sip of his lemonade, and then hands it to Spencer.

"I'm going to go say hi," Brendon says, shrugging a little. "Mingle. That kind of thing."

"I'll come with you," Spencer says, because he's good at reading Brendon and Brendon knows he feels the same way about their unexpected fame. Which is to say, as much as Brendon loves his band and thinks they're awesome, they're essentially talented kids who got a lucky break. Brendon doesn't feel like he's any better than the guys slaving away on the far stages, and he doesn't want to act like he does.

"Here," Spencer says to Zack, handing him the lemonade. "Can you hold this?"

"Uh, no," Zack says. He takes a long slurp. "I can _drink_ it, though." Spencer grins at him, and wipes his sweaty hair out of his eyes.

They end up shooting the shit for a long time, sitting backstage with the other bands and trading war stories. Brendon's kind of lost track of time when he sees Zack looming above him.

"Time to go," Zack says, pointing at his watch. "We're on in thirty. We need to bust ass and get back there."

"Oh, crap," Brendon says. He stands up and wipes his hands off on his jeans. He says goodbye to everyone, takes a few email addresses. On the way back, Spencer bumps his shoulder into Brendon's.

"We're going to be good tonight," Spencer says. "I can feel it. Shit's going to be _on."_

"Yeah?" Brendon says, hurrying to keep up with Zack and Spencer. It's not his fault he has tiny little legs.

"Yeah," Spencer says, and bumps his shoulder again. Brendon smiles to himself.

-

Brendon's curled up in his bunk one night with his laptop, screwing around online because he's pretty sure that if he watches another episode of The OC, he's going to shoot someone. He's got his gmail open in a tab, but he's not really paying much attention to it until the tab starts flashing with a new message.

 _are you busy?_ Spencer says, and Brendon looks up from his computer and raises an eyebrow at Spencer. He's sitting cross-legged on his bunk like, six feet away. Spencer shrugs at him.

 _not really_ , Brendon types back. _you're such a lamer, what's up_

 _you said it was easier for you like this_ , Spencer says. _also your face is lame shut up._

 _touche,_ Brendon writes. For a while it just says that Spencer is typing. Brendon clicks back over to his other tabs and scrolls through the posts he's missed on Cute Overload. There will never be a time when he's not interested in looking at cute dogs.

 _Im not trying to push you_ , Spencer types, eventually. _I get that you don't want to talk about it, and thats cool, but I wanted like a little more detail? I just need to know what happened so I don't do it again. I told you, i'm not an expert at this shit._

Brendon swallows. There's only one way out of this, really, and that's to be as honest as he can be while still lying to Spencer. Because he can't just—Brendon considers it for a moment, considers typing "I really fucking like you and I want to have sex with you and I don't know if we can do this if we're not having sex because I'm too fucking attached," and then his stomach twists and yeah, no. He can imagine what Spencer's face would look like if he typed that. Spencer would be shocked, and confused, and then Brendon would get a well-meaning lecture about how sometimes this stuff can make you really attached but it's not real, it's not anything important. Fuck that shit. Brendon's not interested in Spencer's pity.

 _I'm just kinda worried about you,_ Spencer sends back, after Brendon still hasn't replied. _You're good at faking it but I know something's wrong._

Brendon takes a deep breath, and doesn't look at Spencer. _I freaked out because I liked it too much_ , Brendon writes. _That's all. You didn't do anything wrong, it's just fucking with my head and I think I need to take a break for a while._

 _oh._ Spencer writes. _really?_

 _yeah,_ Brendon writes. _spence i'm sorry i'm a dick. you've been so cool about all of this and i feel like an asshole but I just kind of can't right now. my head's all fucked up._ All of a sudden there's that sting behind his eyes, the one that always comes right before he starts crying, and Brendon swallows heavily and blinks and hopes it's not too obvious that he's actually losing his shit over here. Dammit.

"No, hey," Spencer says, out loud. He puts his computer down and walks over to Brendon's bunk and completely ignores Brendon's laptop in favor of leaning over and hugging him. Brendon presses his face into the crook of Spencer's neck, hiding in his sweatshirt hood. "Dude. Brendon. Don't feel bad, okay? You did the right thing. That's what I wanted to know."

"I'm sorry," Brendon mumbles, for the thousandth time.

"Don't be," Spencer says. "Learning experience, right?" His voice is soft, and vaguely sad, and Brendon is having way too many emotions to process. He's tired, and he's freaked out, and he really likes Spencer, and holding onto him right now is both the best and the worst thing in the world.

"Yeah," Brendon says softly. "Learning experience."

"If you change your mind—" Spencer says, then cuts himself off. "I mean. It's okay if you like, never ever want to do that again, but if you do? I'll be here."

"Thanks," Brendon says, shoving closer into Spencer's arms. "Spence, I just—yeah. Thanks. For everything."

-

They hit France for a day or two, and then Germany again, and then it's back to Paris. Spencer emails Brendon the whole time. Sometimes they talk about nothing, and sometimes they talk more about what happened, and sometimes Spencer just sends him links to dumb YouTube videos.

Brendon still can't be honest with him, entirely, but it's okay. There isn't that sharpness between them anymore. Brendon can hug Spencer and climb all over him and while it makes something hurt, deep down inside, Spencer doesn't push him away. Brendon can watch Spencer out of the corner of his eye and smile when he smiles and not think about how badly he wants something more.

-

They fly into Paris for the second time on June 3rd. They have some interviews scheduled with Virgin Radio in the morning, and a show that night at Parc des Princes, but for the rest of the day Brendon has no responsibilities other than relaxing and feeding himself. Jon takes Ryan and Zack with him to the airport to pick up Cassie, and Brendon and Spencer are left alone for the afternoon.

"What do you want to do?" Brendon says, flipping through the hotel guidebook. It's all in French, but at least some of the picture captions are in English. "I feel like we have way too many options. And we've already done all the touristy shit."

"We have," Spencer says. "I think we should just go out and wander. We'll find a park and chill out and drink wine or something."

"Alright," Brendon says.

It's really nice out. It's warm and sunny and the streets are filled with people and they end up walking a lot farther than they mean to. It's one of those days where Brendon sort of feels as though he's moving underwater, like everything's just happening in slow motion, but it's not a bad feeling. They wander and they poke at shops and they sit on a table in the street and eat the prix fixe three-course lunch. It's not a date, Brendon reminds himself, even when Spencer is laughing and stretching out in his chair and stealing the olives from Brendon's salad. Definitely not a date.

They have some wine with lunch, just the house vintage, and then they buy some better wine and set off in search of a park. There's a patisserie on the corner of the square and they buy croissants, mostly to soak up the booze. There's no real reason they have to stay sober, but Brendon tries not to get hammered in public in foreign countries. At least not without Zack around.

"This is nice," Spencer murmurs, laying back on his jacket on the grass. They've got the wine uncorked and hidden in a paper bag, because they're incredibly classy.

"Yeah," Brendon says. He thinks about holding Spencer's hand, and how much nicer that would make it, but lately he's been sort of resigned about everything. It's okay, he tells himself. It's a beautiful day. This is good. This is enough.

Brendon dozes off for a while in the sunlight, sleepy from the heat and the wine. He wakes up to Spencer brushing the hair off his face. "Hey," Spencer says. "Brendon. Let's get up and get some espresso. You've been sleeping for a while."

"Mmmph," Brendon says. His face feels all big and puffy and he can feel the first twinge of a sunburn when he smiles. He yawns, stands up, stretches, and then follows Spencer across the park to another little cafe.

"Did you go exploring while I was asleep?" Brendon says, when Spencer leads him right to the cafe. "Did you leave me alone and defenseless in a foreign country? You traitor."

"Nah," Spencer says, shrugging. "But I did talk to a guy who spoke English for a while, and he told me to check this place out."

"Oh," Brendon laughs. "Right." Spencer grins at him.

The espresso helps him wake up, and after a cup of that and two glasses of water and some kind of delicious unidentifiable pastry thing, Brendon's feeling rejuvenated.

("I'd like that one, please," Brendon said politely, pointing as the pastry tray came by. "Um. Un—pastry? S'il vous plait."

"Did you seriously just say, 'un pastry?' " Spencer said, after the tray was gone.

"Do you know what this is?" Brendon said, holding the pastry up. "Like, can you think of a better word for this than pastry?"

"No," Spencer said.

"Then shut up," Brendon said, biting into it blissfully.)

"Let's go explore more," Brendon says, and Spencer agrees. It's somewhere around six; they have to be back at the hotel around 7:30 for dinner with the rest of the guys and Cassie.

They end up walking along the banks of the Seine, just sort of wandering in the general direction of their hotel. Brendon figures that if it comes down to it, they can just catch a cab. He's got the address of the hotel tucked in the back pocket of his jeans.

Spencer stops to take a few pictures—a red-and-blue striped awning, a yawning dog sitting at it's owner's feet, a wine bottle floating down the river. He hands the camera to Brendon once he's done, leaning up against the railing. "Here," Spencer says. "Check them out. Some of them came out good."

"Oh, wow," Brendon says, flipping through. "Awesome, dude." The late-afternoon sun gives everything a warm glow; the sun refracts off the water, off the store windows and the glassware on the tables of the cafe. They're really nice pictures.

"I like that one a lot," Spencer says, leaning in. His head is really close to Brendon's, tucked in so they can both see the LCD screen. Sunlight tips the edges of Spencer's eyelashes, and Brendon finds himself turning and leaning in before he can stop himself.

Brendon tips his head up, moving entirely on instinct. Spencer notices and there's a single moment where they're both just moving in, slow, breath by breath, and then Brendon realizes what he's doing and pulls away.

"Shit," Brendon says, helplessly. " _Shit_. I didn't mean to—"

" _Brendon_ ," Spencer says, equally helplessly, and then he leans in, pushes back into Brendon's space and tips his chin up and kisses him.

 _Oh,_ Brendon thinks. _Oh—OH_. Spencer's mouth is warm and firm on his own. His beard is a little scratchy. Brendon pulls back for a second, just to breathe, and then Spencer's dipping his tongue over the curve of Brendon's bottom lip and Brendon's knees go weak and hey, wow, he didn't know that was actually possible.

Spencer pulls him in, one hand on the small of Brendon's back, and Brendon lets himself just go limp, throws his arms around Spencer's neck and lets Spencer hold him up. Spencer nips at his lips, little bites that make Brendon feel warm deep down inside. He doesn't know what this means and right now—at this very moment—Brendon honestly doesn't care. Spencer's a good fucking kisser.

"Wait," Spencer mumbles, suddenly going stiff. "Wait, I—oh, shit."

"Wha?" Brendon mumbles.

"No, wait," Spencer says. He pushes Brendon away gently. "Wait. I didn't mean—this isn't supposed to happen."

"Oh," Brendon says, his stomach falling. He's still a little breathless from what was possibly the best kiss of his life, and now Spencer's telling him it was a mistake?

"I'm sorry," Spencer says, a little frantic. "Brendon, I'm—I'm not trying to fuck with you, I'm really not. Shit, please don't hate me."

"What?" Brendon says again. "I just—what?"

"I have a thing for you," Spencer says, in a rush. "Like a stupid monumental thing, and I know it's dumb and I know we can't and we're in a fucking _band_ togetherand then I freaked you out, and—and. Shit, What the hell am I going to do?" Spencer turns away, rubbing one palm over his eyes, and Brendon tries to remember how to breathe.

"Wait," Brendon says, catching at Spencer's hand. "Go back. Back to that first part."

"What first part?" Spencer says. "The part where I can't believe I just let myself do that?"

"Yeah," Brendon says quietly, starting to smile helplessly. "That one."

"Why are you smiling?" Spencer says, frowning at him.

" _Spencer_ ," Brendon says, shaking his head, and then he's sort of launching himself at Spencer, twining his arms around his neck and kissing him. Spencer makes a surprised noise under his mouth. "I really like you," Brendon mumbles. "I like you a whole fucking lot and I was flipping my shit, dude."

"Oh," Spencer says.

"I know we can't do this," Brendon murmurs, in between kisses. "I know it's a bad idea. But we're going to do this right now, okay? Just for right now. Please."

"Like I'm going to say no," Spencer mumbles. He's got one hand on the small of Brendon's back, and Brendon has to go up on his toes a little to kiss him. It's awesome. Everything right now in Brendon's life is awesome, holy shit.

"How long does 'right now' last?" Spencer says, after a few minutes of kisses and breeze and sunshine.

"What do you mean?"

"Like, say," Spencer says. "Does 'right now' mean we can make out later?"

"We really shouldn't," Brendon says. He bites his lip.

"Yeah," Spencer says.

"Is it bad if I don't really care?" Brendon says, in a small voice. He knows he sounds hopeful. "Maybe 'right now' can be a, a day. Or a couple of days?"

"I was really hoping you'd say that," Spencer says. He laughs, and kisses Brendon's smile.

-

Dinner is loud, and joyful. Cassie's here, and Jon can't seem to stop smiling at her. Spencer's in a great mood, and so is Brendon, and Ryan has no idea what the hell is going on.

"Did you guys all take something when I wasn't looking?" Ryan says, after the fourth time that someone has started laughing at nothing in particular, and everyone else has joined in. "Are you all fucking stoned?"

"I'm kinda drunk," Brendon points out. He's still barely sober from the wine they'd been drinking all afternoon, and dinner itself had started with cocktails. Whatever. He doesn't have to be anywhere important until 9am tomorrow.

"Is that what you guys did all afternoon?" Ryan says. "Wandered around Paris and got trashed?"

"We had lunch," Spencer says, shrugging. "And we got croissants and stuff. And _then_ we got trashed."

"You're so irresponsible," Ryan says, but he's grinning at Spencer. There's a moment where it's just the two of them, snickering at each other in their own little world, and Brendon thinks about how so many things about this conversation could never have happened four years ago. _We've all changed so much_ , Brendon thinks, but it's not a particularly sad thought. The world keeps turning, and all that. Ryan doesn't cling to Spencer like a lifeline anymore, and Spencer's more willing to let go.

"Your mom's irresponsible," Spencer says, and Ryan rolls his eyes. " 'Your mom jokes' aren't funny when it's an easy target," Ryan says, and Spencer snorts and ruffles his hair.

 _Way different_ , Brendon thinks.

The whole dinner is a long, lazy affair; it takes almost four hours. Brendon's not concerned about it. He's warm and full and Spencer keeps brushing their feet together under the table. The wine makes him sleepy after the large meal, and by the time dessert shows up he's practically yawning into his glass.

Ryan pokes him. "Don't fall asleep in your creme brulee," he says, sipping his coffee. "Shit might get messy."

"I'll show you messy," Brendon says. He cracks the top of the caramelized sugar with his spoon, and lifts it to his mouth. "Oh, _shit_ ," Brendon says, and it comes out a lot like a moan. "That is awesome."

"Stop," Ryan says, frowning. "Seriously. Do you know how many sex noises I'm going to have to listen to tonight? I'm not even on the clock yet."

"Mmmm," Brendon says, making another obnoxiously satisfied noise. "Oh, _fuck_."

"That's it," Ryan says. "I'm sleeping in your room. You can sleep with the make-out twins." He nods his head over to Jon and Cassie, who are practically curled up in one chair.

"Hey," Jon says, slightly wounded. "We're not that bad. Are we?"

"Don't apologize to him," Spencer says, rolling his eyes. "He's just cranky because he hasn't been laid in a month."

"Don't remind me," Ryan mutters. Brendon gives him a sympathetic shoulder bump. Keltie's on tour all summer with her show, and so far her and Ryan's schedules haven't matched up once.

Jon and Cassie make a blushing, hurried escape after dessert ends. Ryan turns to Brendon and Spencer. "We're going out," Ryan says, making a face. "Because I am seriously not stepping foot in that room for at least another two hours. You guys in?"

"Um," Brendon says. He means to make up an excuse, but then he's yawning again, long and loud.

"I'm with you," Spencer says, yawning in sympathy. "Dammit, I hate it when that happens. Anyway. I think we're out, Ry. I'm fucking exhausted."

Ryan shakes his head. "Traitors," he says, without malice. "It's cool. No, really. Zack and Shane and I will go bond and you'll miss out on our awesome-life changing experience."

"At the hotel bar?" Brendon says, standing up and stretching. "Gee, I'm so upset."

"You should be," Ryan says. "I think they have absinthe."

-

Brendon shuffles his feet a little when they get back to their room. "Hey," Brendon says awkwardly. They're standing in the doorway of their suite, the door securely locked behind them. Spencer has his hands in his pockets.

"Hey," Spencer says, and gives Brendon this little sideways grin.

"This is so stupid," Brendon says, starting to smile back. "This is the dumbest shit we've ever come up with, seriously."

"Yup," Spencer says, and then he's leaning in to kiss Brendon again. He presses Brendon back against the door, but it's slow, almost lazy. It's an odd disjunction. Brendon feels like they should be clawing at each other, ripping their clothing off and having mind-blowing sex, or something. But Spencer's hands are gentle on his hips, and his mouth is soft, and Brendon realizes that right now he wants nothing more than this, lazy bed-time makeouts and Spencer's hair catching on his eyelashes.

"We should—we have a bed," Brendon mumbles. "Making out is easier when you're lying down." Spencer grins against his mouth. "Hey," Spencer says. "Hey. Is it cool if—can we just, for tonight? Just this. I'm really tired, and I know you haven't, um—"

"Yeah," Brendon says. "It's totally cool. Way to read my mind, dude."

"I can't help it that I'm psychic," Spencer says. They're still kissing. Spencer's mouth slides over Brendon's, catching sharp and sudden at the corner of Brendon's mouth. Brendon feels himself melt a little.

"What am I thinking right now?" Brendon mumbles, pushing Spencer gently back. "Hmmm, genius?"

"You're thinking that making out is awesome," Spencer says. "And that you really want to go get in bed so we can make out and also not have to be upright."

"It's not psychic if you're just restating the obvious," Brendon says. He yawns, long and loud. His jaw cracks a little. "C'mon," Spencer says, and tugs at his sleeve. They cross the suite slowly, kicking off shoes and jeans and socks as they go. Brendon hovers for a moment with his hands on his t-shirt, and then he shrugs and pulls it off. Spencer's seen him naked, and he's seen him in his underwear, and nothing about this is going to surprise him. Brendon just hates sleeping in his clothes.

It's cold in the hotel room. Goosebumps raise on his forearms once he's divested himself of his clothing, and Spencer looks over at him and then dives under the covers. Brendon laughs. Spencer's wearing his boxers and a pair of pajama pants, and they're soft against Brendon's legs when he burrows himself in. They have a little cocoon under there, a hump of blankets tucked in over and around them. Brendon wiggles until he's on top of Spencer. He leans down and kisses him, slow and careful. Spencer's hands come up, rubbing up and down Brendon's back.

It's so easy between them, disturbingly so. It shouldn't be this easy. Brendon's never done this before; he had expected it to feel strange and new and scary, but it's just—-Spencer. The sensations are different, because Spencer has things like chest hair and a beard and a dick that's half-hard against Brendon's own, but other than that it feels strikingly familiar. Maybe it's because he's so used to being in Spencer's space, used to the way he moves his body and curls his arms around Brendon; maybe it's because of everything else, the feel of Spencer's hands on his skin and the overwhelming loss of control. In a weird way, it feels like they've already had sex. Huh.

Brendon breaks away, because all of these separate trains of thoughts have suddenly converged into one bright, undeniable conclusion. "This isn't just for right now, is it," Brendon blurts out. "This. I mean. We can't—This is more than just 'right now.' "

Spencer swallows.

"Uh, sorry," Brendon says. "Maybe I shouldn't have just thrown that out there. My bad. Back to the making out, okay?"

"No," Spencer says. "No, it's - Yeah. Something like that. Let's just—I don't have any answers, Brendon. I didn't plan this and I'm not going to plan this, so. It is what it is."

"Yeah," Brendon says quietly. He knows what Spencer means, what Spencer's not saying. It's that they've been hit with this monumentally awesome thing, this sort of strange new love (and it _is_ love, Brendon is sure of it, abruptly certain in a way that's slightly unsettling) that's completely wonderful and completely fucking impractical. There's no answers for this. They're just going to have to go along for the ride.

Spencer watches him for a moment, and then kisses him again, careful and sweet. Brendon twines his fingers in Spencer's hair, scratches along the base of his skull. Spencer makes this little purring noise into his mouth that's probably the cutest fucking thing Brendon's ever heard.

"Yeah," Brendon says again, smiling helplessly.

-

"That was the worst absinthe I've ever had in my life," Ryan grumbles, the next morning. "I was expecting like, a life-changing experience, right? You'd think with all the shit those poets wrote it would be more than just a buzz and a hangover. What the fuck, man."

"Ryan," Jon says slowly. "You know they don't sell actual absinthe here, right? It's the wormwood that makes you trip. This stuff is just strong booze."

"Oh," Ryan says. He sips his coffee. "When you say here, you mean at this hotel?"

"No, I mean like, in the European Union," Jon says. "I think you can only sell it in Eastern Europe. Maybe Russia."

"Let's go to Russia," Ryan says, immediately. "Guys. Do they like us in Russia? We need to break into the Russian market."

"We're not going to Russia," Zack says. "You'd all freeze your tiny little legs off. Ryan would lose all his fingers."

"I'd wear gloves," Ryan says seriously. "I have lots of gloves. Remember, Zack? So many gloves."

"I'm going to tell this interviewer you want to go to Russia," Brendon threatens. They're all in the car on the way to the Virgin Atlantic interview. Brendon is slightly cranky. He and Spencer spent too long trading sleepy morning kisses, and now his latte is lukewarm and the foamed milk has gone flat. "I'm going to say it's your life-long dream but you're worried about the cold, and there will be some sort of internet outcry and then your condo will be drowned in a sea of fan-made hats and gloves and scarves."

Ryan stares at him for a moment. "But that's _awesome_ ," he says, confused. "How is that a threat? That would be awesome."

-

The problem with making out with Spencer is that now that Brendon knows what he's missing, he wants it _all the time_. Brendon knew he had a healthy sex drive, but this is ridiculous. Spencer will give him a sideways glance and then he'll casually wander out of the green room; Brendon will wait a few minutes, twitchy and restless, and then follow him out. The first time Brendon had followed him out, he'd been expecting some rushed, harried makeouts; instead, Spencer had blown him in a maintenance closet.

It had sort of all gone downhill (or uphill) from there.

(Brendon has jerked off eight times to that memory. Spencer had been pretty rough with him—not mean, exactly, but Brendon really hadn't had much say in the matter. Spencer had just given him a look, something dark and promising, and then Brendon had been shoved up against the wall, Spencer's hands firm on his hips.

One of his wrists had trapped behind his back, caught in a tangle of brooms and mop handles; Brendon had pushed back further, feeling the sharp sting all down his arm. He'd reached out one hand to tangle in Spencer's hair, but Spencer had circled his fingers around Brendon's wrist and that trapped that hand against Brendon's hip, his fingers digging in.

It had taken Brendon roughly two minutes to come, finally losing it when Spencer had looked up at him, mouth full, and raised an eyebrow.)

They make out in a single-stall bathroom in Belgium, and Brendon ends up jerking Spencer off. He can't help it; he's been thinking about it for days, but they haven't been rooming together and Brendon hasn't managed to think of a way to force Jon to switch with Spencer without raising his bandmates' suspicion. It's already starting to become obvious; Ryan has taken to proclaiming loudly and obnoxiously that some people need to stop sneaking off and keeping their own private stash. Brendon knows they're sort of heading for disaster, or at least a few really awkward conversations, but he's still got Spencer's dick in his hand because Jesus, how can he not?

"Shit," Spencer gasps out, into Brendon's mouth. Brendon tightens his hand, and swipes his thumb across the head of Spencer's dick. It's really nice. Brendon's seen it before, obviously, but he'd never taken much of a personal interest in it. He'd never seen Spencer hard. Brendon thinks about Spencer fucking him, holding him down and pulling on his hair and he whimpers into Spencer's mouth, speeding up his hand. He wants to see Spencer come. If they weren't in such a rush, Brendon would be stripping his clothes off and kneeling down on the bathroom floor and begging Spencer to come on his face.

"Harder," Spencer says, and Brendon tightens his hand even more. It's a little rough, so he breaks away from Spencer's mouth and leans down, opening up his hand and spitting on Spencer's dick. Spencer's hips jerk forward.

"Do that again," Spencer growls, and Brendon does it again. His lips are so close, seriously, and Brendon wants to but he doesn't know if he's allowed, and then he realizes somewhere in his mind that they aren't doing that anymore, so it doesn't matter if he's allowed to.

It still feels like it matters.

Brendon looks up at Spencer. He's flushed, panting heavily, and he's looking down at Brendon with that dark look again, the one that makes Brendon want to roll over and beg. "Only if you want to," Spencer grits out, and Brendon's opening his mouth before Spencer's even finished his sentence. He swipes his tongue across the head. It's interesting, a spongy sort of texture that Brendon has no comparison for. Spencer tastes salty and thick, and Brendon wraps his lips around the head and sucks, collecting the taste on his tongue.

He's still working his hand, and Spencer's hips are pushing forward helplessly, but he's not expecting it when Spencer comes. His mouth is suddenly full, and Brendon tries to swallow but he has to pull back before he chokes. Spencer's come dribbles down his chin, and Brendon's about to reach up and wipe it off when he stops. Spencer's just _looking_ at him, silent and still, and then he's pulling Brendon up roughly with one hand on his bicep. Brendon opens his mouth—to apologize, maybe, even though rationally he knows that not swallowing everything isn't something he has to apologize for—and then Spencer's biting at his lips, sucking at them, licking the taste of himself off of Brendon. Brendon whimpers, pressing his dick into Spencer's hip.

Spencer reaches down, trailing his fingertips along the length of Brendon's dick, trapped in his jeans. It's a strange contrast to the savagery up above, the way Spencer's biting and sucking at Brendon's mouth. Strange, but welcome. Brendon bucks forward into the touch.

"Ask me for it," Spencer growls. "I want to hear you."

"Please," Brendon says, immediately. "Please, please, that was so hot, fuck, please, Spence—"

Spencer's hand firms a little, rubbing down harder, but still not nearly enough pressure. "Keep going," Spencer says. Brendon begs for it while Spencer teases him, slowly increasing the pressure until he's rubbing firmly up and down Brendon's trapped dick. Brendon's so close, and he doesn't even know what he's saying—words, half-phrases, interspersed with _please, please, god, please._ Brendon wants to come, but there's something holding him back; it feels like he's on the edge of a cliff, strung tight and oversensitive, unable to fall. It doesn't make sense until Spencer bites just below his earlobe, whispers _come on, now, I want you to_ , and then the tension snaps. Brendon comes in his jeans and oh, god, this is going to be _impossible_ to explain away. Shit.

Spencer freezes.

"Wha?" Brendon mumbles, still twitching a little against Spencer. "What's—are you. What's wrong?"

Spencer just looks at him, but now it's different. He looks small, and scared, and Brendon's brain is having a lot of trouble figuring out what the hell is going on. Spencer really shouldn't look like that after mind-blowing furtive bathroom sex.

"I have to go," Spencer says, and his voice sounds weird, too. He kisses Brendon hurriedly, strangely intense, cupping his face in both hands. "I'm so sorry," Spencer says. "I need to. Fuck. I'll just—I'm sorry." Brendon's left standing in the bathroom with come in his jeans, clutching at empty air.

"Um," Brendon says, to the mirror. "What the _fuck_?"

-

 _we need to talk_ , Spencer texts him, as Brendon is standing side-stage with Jon watching their openers. They're decent. They're nothing special but Brendon is weird and confused and watching them with Jon is preferable to sitting in the green room with Ryan and Spencer and pretending that everything is fine.

 _yeah, we do_ , Brendon sends back. Part of him doesn't want to be angry; eye for an eye, and all that. He did worse to Spencer in Vegas. The rest of him is blindingly furious, coupled with a healthy dose of fear. It twists in his gut and makes him nauseous.

Jon leans over, and Brendon quickly shoves his phone back in his pocket. "You okay?" Jon mouths, over the sound of the guitars and the drums. Brendon nods back. "Yeah," Brendon mouths, and then he stops and shakes his head, because really, who is he kidding? "No," Brendon says. "But it's okay." Jon frowns at him for a moment, concerned, and then he sidles over so their shoulders and feet are touching. He kind of rubs his shoulder against Brendon's shoulder, a friendly _hi, I'm here._

Brendon smiles a little, in spite of himself.

-

"So if you're freaking out, that's okay," Brendon rambles. He can't seem to shut up. He's too nervous. "That's fine. I get it, I mean, yeah. But if you're about to tell me we have to stop doing this and that you've suddenly realized you don't want to have sex with me, I'm going to need you to get it over with really fast so I can go get shit-faced."

"That's - no," Spencer says. "That's really not it." He's pacing. He's making Brendon antsy. Brendon is sitting down on the couch in Spencer and Ryan's suite, but he can't seem to stop shifting or moving his leg.

"Then what's your deal?" Brendon says. Spencer looks over at him, and he's wearing an expression of this strange sort of infinite sadness, like he's staring into the abyss or something.

"Brendon, shit. I'm really fucking sorry. I know I shouldn't have done that," Spencer says. "You said—but I couldn't help it, and this is why I—this is why I never, okay? I never mixed the two because I didn't think I could actually trust myself not to fuck it up."

"Um," Brendon says. "Can you repeat all that in English?" He's never heard Spencer at such a loss for words. It's unsettling.

"I wasn't trying to do," Spencer waves his hand, " _that_. With the—you know. It just happened. I didn't mean to. This is why I never have sex with the people that I'm topping, okay? I never have. Like yeah, okay, porn, no big deal, but I've never mixed the two in real life because it scares the shit out of me. And I just," Spencer says, quiet and scared. "What if I can't stop?"

"Well, eventually we'll stop," Brendon says, confused. "Usually the stopping point is after orgasms."

"No, I mean," Spencer says. "Brendon. You don't even know—there's so much that I want when you're like that. What if I hurt you? And it's way too much. Or what if everything gets all weird, and we're mixing things we shouldn't mix. Like the other time, and then you _left_ ," Spencer says, and his voice is shaking. Brendon swallows hard.

"Hey," Brendon says, reaching out a hand and tugging Spencer in. Spencer comes willingly. He sits down heavily on the couch, and Brendon curls himself into his side, wrapping both arms around his waist. "I'm right here," Brendon says softly. "It was okay, Spence. It wasn't anything I didn't want to do. I'm fine." He gets it, all of a sudden; the strange look on Spencer's face afterwards, the way he'd been so miserable in Vegas, scared and trying to play it cool. It hits him like a punch to the gut, and Brendon suddenly can't breathe so well.

"You said you didn't want to do that kind of thing anymore," Spencer whispers. "And I didn't care."

"I didn't want to do that anymore because I realized I really liked you," Brendon says. "I couldn't handle it if we weren't actually together. I wanted you too much. Fuck, I really didn't mean for that to fuck you up so bad. This was never about you, Spence. It was about me being an idiot. It was never about me wanting to leave _you._ "

"Oh," Spencer says.

"But that's not the point," Brendon says. "I mean, that's one of the points, but not the main one. It's that I trust you, you know? I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't trust you."

"I know," Spencer says. "But I already went too far. You told me not to do that, and I mean—fuck, Brendon, you were crying. You told me you couldn't do it anymore and then I did it anyway."

"Yeah," Brendon says. When Spencer puts it like that—yeah, maybe that was kind of fucked up.

"It's just—there's no rules," Spencer says. "There have to be rules, and it's easy when you're just—when that's all you're doing with someone. But when it's you and me and we're getting high and eating Doritos one day and then I'm tying you up the next and it—do you know what I mean?" Spencer says, soft and worried. "It fucks with you."

"Yeah," Brendon says. "I know." He thinks about lying in Spencer's bed, tired and confused and unable to relax precisely because they'd blurred the lines.

"It really sucked when you left," Spencer says. "I'm not mad, I mean I wasn't, not really, but—yeah. That was shitty. I can't—we can't do that kind of thing if I'm afraid you're going to leave me after." He takes a deep breath. "It's not worth it," Spencer whispers. "I'd rather have you."

"Spence," Brendon says, and then he's leaning in, hugging Spencer tightly. He shoves his face into Spencer's shoulder and holds on and breathes in his smell, the soft way his chest rises and falls. "Me too," Brendon says. "But I'm not going anywhere."

"You can't promise that," Spencer says. "Don't promise me that."

"No," Brendon says. He's mumbling into Spencer's chest, so he pulls back so it's easier to speak. "But I can promise to say something when my head's fucked up, even if I don't want to."

"Brendon," Spencer says, shaking his head. "Is that really going to fix this?"

"No, for real," Brendon says, plunging forward. "I think we, like—all of this shit, it's all because we suck at talking about it. And I hate talking about it, I do, but if we just—we're in this together. You can catch me, or I'll catch you, and it's not that hard to stop it if it all goes wrong."

Spencer's quiet for a long moment. "There have to be rules," Spencer says. "I need to think about it."

"Okay," Brendon says. "And for the record, I'm sorry I was an asshole."

"Don't—yeah," Spencer says. "I'm sorry I fucked up this up so bad. But can we just—it's forgiven, okay?" Brendon nods. He's so tired of all of this, tired of feeling sad and scared inside whenever he thinks about all the complications. He wants them to move forward, somehow, and apparently Spencer feels the same. It's a huge relief, a lightning of tension somewhere inside his chest.

It's not that easy—of course it isn't—but it's a start.

Brendon can't really help it; he leans in and kisses Spencer, just once. It's soft, hesitant, but Spencer relaxes into it after a moment.

"Forgiven," Brendon says, and Spencer half-smiles against him.


	5. Chapter 5

Brendon wakes up to the sound of a key-card clicking in the lock. He blinks, and then Ryan's standing in front of him, looking completely confused. Jon is peeking out from behind his shoulder. Brendon can't figure out what they're staring at, until he wakes up a little more and realizes that Spencer's spooning him on the couch. He's got one hand tucked up under Brendon's sweatshirt, warm on his bare stomach. They can't exactly explain this one away.

"Um," Brendon says, and then Spencer stirs, nuzzling into the back of his neck. He mumbles something sleepily, and then pulls Brendon in tighter. Ryan's eyes get wider.

"Holy shit," Ryan says. "You guys are totally fucking."

"Uh," Brendon says, and then Spencer sits straight up, going stock still. "Shit," Spencer says. "Shit, shit, shit."

"You are a lying asshole," Ryan says, pointing at him. "Huge. Lying. Asshole."

"Fuck," Spencer says. He sounds incredibly guilty, and that really seals the deal, as far as Brendon's concerned.

"It was complicated," Brendon says, carefully. His stomach is sinking. Of course the minute they start to figure things out, everything goes balls-up.

"It's not that complicated," Jon says, but it looks like he's trying hard to keep a straight face.

"Ryan," Spencer says, plaintively. "Seriously, I can totally explain."

"Uh-huh," Ryan says. "You've got five minutes." He looks—not angry, exactly, but something very close to it.

"Can we—come on," Spencer says, sitting up and grabbing at Ryan's wrist. "Come outside with me, okay."

"Fine," Ryan says, his mouth pressed into a thin line. He follows Spencer with a sour expression, but a minimum of actual resistance. Brendon's left staring at Jon Walker's increasingly amused face as the door clicks behind them.

"So how's that gay sex treating you?" Jon says, after exactly three minutes of stone-dead, awkward silence. Brendon stares at him, and then Jon loses it. "Oh my god," Jo says, cracking up. "I can't believe you guys are really—this is hysterical. We are _actually_ the gayest band in the world."

"I—yeah," Brendon says, sheepish. "Maybe, yeah."

"Ryan is so pissed," Jon says, shaking his head and sitting down next to Brendon. "He thought something was up. I just thought you guys had found a good weed source and didn't want to share."

"I'm really sorry," Brendon says miserably. He wonders how many times he can apologize in one day. Maybe he can break the all-time world record. "I know this is going to fuck everything up, and we tried, Jon, we tried _so hard_ but it just kind of—"

"Whoa, whoa, hey," Jon says, holding up his hands. "No details, okay? I am totally supportive, here, but you guys are like my brothers. There is such a thing as over-sharing."

"I was talking about the band," Brendon says.

"Oh," Jon says. "That." He's quiet for a moment, and then he shrugs.

"It happens," Jon says. "I mean, I was so pissed at Tom and Bill for a long time, even though it was none of my business. I thought they'd just been thinking with their dicks. But then Tom was drunk and he was so _miserable_ , and he kept being like, 'What if it was Cassie? What if you had to see her every day, all day, and you knew you shouldn't but it was killing you not to?' " Jon holds up his hands, palm up. "And, I mean. He was right. He _is_ right. You can't just stop loving someone because you want to."

Brendon blinks at him.

"Yeah," Brendon says. "Pretty much."

"Okay then," Jon says. "So anyway. We were going to see if you guys wanted to burn it up." He digs around in his pocket, and comes up with a dime bag and his tiny little chillum, the glass one with the red swirly bits around the base. "Eh? eh?" Jon says, wiggling it around enticingly.

"Oh, hell yes," Brendon says, nodding frantically. "Yes yes yes."

"Sweet," Jon says. He nods approvingly, and starts to pack the bowl.

-

By the time Ryan and Spencer come back, Brendon is very, very stoned.

"Dude," Brendon says, and flops his hand out towards Jon. He kind of waves it around a little, hoping Jon will get the message. His throat burns from the chillum. It's such a sweet little thing, but it hits really hard.

"Whaaaaat," Jon says, flapping his hand back. "Bden. Your hand. What?"

"You're bogarting," Brendon says. "I haven't taken a hit in like. Ten years."

"It's in your hand," Jon says, and Brendon looks down and oh, hey. Huh. He rubs his thumb along the glass. It's really smooth under his fingers. Brendon likes having fingers.

"Fingers are so cool," Brendon says, because he doesn't have much of a filter when he's high. "Imagine if, like. If you didn't have them. I can't imagine how much that must suck."

"Yeah," Jon says. "You'd have to shove your face into everything to feel it." He leans over and nudges his nose against Brendon's shoulder, like a dog, and Brendon can't stop giggling.

The door clicks, and it sounds like it's very far away. Brendon blinks, and then Spencer is in front of him and reaching down for the chillum in his hand. "Give me that," Spencer says. "My brain is scarred for life. I need to be really, really stoned so I can forget that I just had that conversation."

"Me first," Ryan says urgently. "No, me. I know more about your dick than I ever have in my entire life, and now I need to forget all of it as fast as possible." Brendon snorts, and hands over the bowl. Ryan taps the ash out hurriedly, and shoves a bud into the top. "He's not mad," Brendon says, raising his eyes to Spencer's. "He's not killing me so stuff's okay, right? Jon said he's not mad. He got all romantic and shit about true love."

"Love's totally important," Jon says earnestly, sitting back up. "It, like. Makes the world go round."

"I'm going to throw up if you ever say that again," Ryan mumbles.

"We must reinvent looooooooooooooooooooooove," Brendon warbles, and Ryan flails out a hand and smacks him. "You can reinvent all the love you want," Ryan says. "But only if Spencer never, ever tells me about his dick ever again."

"Agreed," Spencer says instantly. "And don't make it seem like I just dragged you outside and talked about my dick. You _asked_."

"I asked before I actually thought about what I was asking," Ryan says. "You should know this by now. You're not supposed to actually listen when I talk." He pulls the chillum away, and coughs for a moment before handing it over to Spencer.

They smoke another two bowls. Or three, maybe. Brendon's not keeping track. Ryan turns the TV on, and they watch a nature documentary about volcanoes. Jon keeps making really terrible orgasm jokes, and Ryan keeps cringing and Brendon can't stop laughing. Spencer is bright red.

"Brendon," Jon says eventually, pawing ineffectually at his forearm. "Give Ryan your key-card."

"Huh?" Brendon says. He blinks sleepily. He's pretty sure he has actually melded with the couch.

"So Ryan can stay with me tonight," Jon says. "Or, uh. This morning. I think we need to be in Ireland in like sixteen hours."

"Urgh," Brendon says. He shuffles around uselessly on the couch, trying to reach his back pocket. "Spencer," Brendon says. "Spence. Can you reach my key card?"

"Hmm?" Spencer says. His eyes are really red, and he's got a lazy smile on his face. "Oh, yeah." He wiggles his hand until it's directly on top of Brendon's ass, and then plucks the keycard out and hands it to Jon, who hands it to Ryan. Ryan makes a gagging noise. "I'm leaving now," Ryan says, wrinkling his nose. "Try to keep your hands off Brendon's ass until I leave."

"It's a nice ass," Jon says, sitting up and stretching. "You have to admit it, Ry."

"I admit nothing," Ryan says, but he's got a lopsided grin on his face.

-

Ireland and Scotland pass in a blur. He and Spencer are officially rooming together, in a non-official sort of way, and that would be awesome except Brendon's so exhausted that he's pretty much out as soon as his head hits the pillow. He's barely even aware of Spencer sleeping next to him, and once their alarms go off, they usually have roughly thirty minutes to get dressed and be somewhere. It's not really conducive to bonding.

The last night of the tour is a high, a brilliant, sleep-deprived high. They play a long show; the crowd's super into it, and Brendon dances around on stage and grins at Jon and sings obnoxiously into Ryan's ear. Ryan rolls his eyes, but Brendon knows he doesn't really mind.

They've got a five AM red-eye back to the states, which means they have a few hours to kill. Brendon's already sent half his stuff back; theoretically it's going to be waiting for him at his condo. He's got two duffle bags and a backpack and the beginnings of a hangover, which usually means he needs to drink more.

They sit and eat sausage and eggs and the full English breakfast at the airport. They all order beer to go with it. It's 3am. Brendon's starting to feel loopy. He hasn't slept in something like twenty-two hours. Zack nods off next to him, and Brendon has to keep poking him so he'll stay awake.

Their seats are broken up, this time; a full row, three and seven and three. They've got everyone with them, or at least everyone who isn't staying in Europe for some other tour. Brendon is technically sitting next to Ryan. He leans over and switches Ryan and Spencer's boarding passes when neither is looking.

"I saw that," Ryan says, yawning. "You know the mile-high club is a lie, right?"

"Look," Brendon says. "I can drool on you, or I can drool on Spencer. It's up to you."

"Ugh," Ryan says.

The flight itself is barely half-full. They wait until after take-off, and then they all spread out in the back of the plane, tossing backpacks on seats and stretching out their legs. Brendon and Spencer have three seats to themselves, on the left side near the window. Brendon digs in his bag, and comes up with two packages of Sour-Patch Kids, a bag of pretzels, and a bottle of water.

"Gimme," Spencer says, grabbing the pretzels. "Oh fuck yes. You know they're not going to feed us for like. Hours."

"Yeah," Brendon says. They turn the lights off, and Brendon leans into Spencer's side. He sticks the Sour Patch Kids by his hip, tucked into the side of the chair, and alternates eating those and stealing a pretzel from Spencer's bag. He does the math. He's been awake for twenty-seven hours.

"I'm bored," Brendon whispers. "Let's have really inappropriate conversations about sex and see how long it takes them to notice."

"I haven't showered in two days," Spencer says. "I really don't want to talk about sex right now."

"Not in a sexy way," Brendon says.

"Uh-huh," Spencer says.

-

"No, for real," Brendon says, gesturing expansively. "It was fucking _insane_ , dude. I'm watching this and Brent's all yeah, dude, that's hot, right? And I'm just sitting there going _holy shit_ , because I am not kidding, they were both hung like fucking, fucking _Ryan_ or something _—_ "

"Wow, this story suddenly got 100% less sexy," Spencer says.

"It's not sexy in the first place," Brendon says. "I thought she was going to break something. It was horrifying."

"That kind of thing usually is," Spencer says. "Not that I'm judging. But it's not hot when no one's having fun."

"She was definitely not having fun," Brendon says. "But, I don't know. Maybe if she was into it, it would have been hot."

"You think?" Spencer says, and there's something interested in his voice. Brendon pauses. "I mean," Brendon says. "Yeah. You know. It's all—I'd be the focus of attention. For everyone. That's kind of hot."

"I thought we were talking about a porn star," Spencer says, grinning at him. Brendon replays what he's just said, and then shrugs sheepishly. He's so tired he barely even knows what he's saying. If he's ever had a filter, he definitely doesn't have one right now.

"It's your turn," Brendon says. "Worst porn you've ever seen. Go."

Spencer blinks at him for a minute, and then he suddenly snickers. Brendon raises an eyebrow. "Okay," Spencer says. "I know I'm really tired, and that's probably not an excuse, but I was really tempted right there to say 'skullfucking' just to see what you would do."

"Asshole," Brendon laughs. He feels something inside his chest start to relax. "For the record. You're not allowed to fuck my skull. I mean, except like, if we are talking about blowjobs. In which case all of my skin is attached to my skull, and my skull is still attached to my body."

Spencer makes a horrified face, and then shakes his head. "You've been watching too much CSI," Spencer says. "No more talking about skullfucking. I take it back. Never mention that word ever again in my presence."

"Right," Brendon says. He squeezes the arm that's wrapped around Spencer's stomach. "Seriously, though."

"I haven't watched a lot of bad porn," Spencer says. "Usually if I'm watching porn, its, you know. Good."

"As I found out," Brendon mumbles. The thought makes his face heat a little. Spencer does have a pretty great collection, or at least he knows where to find it. "So tell me about the best one, then."

"That's probably a bad idea," Spencer says, raising an eyebrow. "I don't really want to have to go jerk off in the plane bathroom."

"I'd help," Brendon says immediately, and then feels his face heat further. Whoops. Spencer just raises an eyebrow at him, considering. Brendon realizes he's holding his breath. For a stupid, too-long moment, he's actually considering it, and then Spencer shakes his head ruefully.

"Out of all the bad ideas we've had," Spencer says. "That one is really terrible."

"Yeah," Brendon says.

"Which is why I'm going to need you to talk me out of it," Spencer continues. "Because right now I don't actually care, and I think that's a bad thing." Brendon laughs. Across the aisle, Jon stirs sleepily and blinks at them. "Go back to sleep," Spencer says, to Jon. "We're not there yet." Jon yawns, and rolls over towards Zack's shoulder.

"Fine," Brendon says. "Spencer, in no way am I going to help you jerk off in the plane bathroom."

"Guys, I can hear you," Jon mumbles. "And if I can, that means the rest of the plane can, too."

"Sorry," Spencer says. It's completely insincere, but he lowers his voice when he turns back to Brendon. "Actually," Spencer whispers, after a few minutes of comfortable silence. "I've kind of—I've been thinking about stuff. You know. The stuff we talked about in—god, I don't even remember. Spain?"

"I think it was Spain," Brendon whispers back. "What were you thinking about?"

"Us," Spencer says. "I was thinking that maybe we can at least—set some rules. Try it out. I don't want to spend forever just being scared of what could happen." He looks over at Brendon, and he's abruptly serious. "I spent a long time being scared of it," Spencer says quietly. "But I don't want to do that with you."

"Oh," Brendon says, smiling a little. "Okay." He's so tired, and yet suddenly there's this energy in his body, a jittery, excited sort of restlessness. He forces himself to be still. "What kind of rules?"

"This might sound really dumb," Spencer says. "But can we just—for a while, at least. I kind of need us to just be like 'okay, this is going to get interesting and kinky tonight,' or 'no, we're just going to make out,' or 'no, we're just going to fuck and that's it,' " Spencer says. Brendon breathes in sharply when Spencer says the word _fuck_ , and then coughs to try and hide it. "But that's not the important part, the important part is actually sticking to that afterwards. Even if we really don't want to. I just—I need to know I can trust you. And myself," Spencer says.

Brendon nods slowly. "I can do that," Brendon says. "That's not weird. It's actually kind of—I don't know. It makes it less intimidating."

"Yeah," Spencer says. "I think it will. And I didn't mean to say that I _don't_ trust you, already, because I do, um—"

"Spence," Brendon says, shaking his head a little. He leans in and kisses Spencer on the lips, a long, slow kiss. "I get it," Brendon says, breaking away afterwards. "I know what you mean. You don't have to apologize for wanting to set some rules."

"Okay," Spencer says. "Okay, good." He still sounds a little nervous, so Brendon curls in closer. He reaches down and tugs the plane blanket over them, and then wiggles his foot around until he can wrap his sweatshirt around Spencer's feet. Spencer's toes are usually cold. "We'll talk about it more," Brendon says. "I promise. But right now let's just hang out and not worry about it. We'll figure it all out later. We've got lots of time."

"Yeah," Spencer says, quiet and fond. He runs the tips of his fingers along Brendon's side, under the blanket. "Okay. I'm cool with that."

-

 _come over,_ Brendon sends, typing the words out carefully on his phone.

 _you sure?_ Spencer sends back, and Brendon rolls his eyes at the phone. _YES,_ Brendon types, in all caps. _COME OVER. I AM VERY SURE._ It takes few minutes, but Spencer eventually texts him back with a _lol okay. be there in twenty._ Brendon rubs his hands on his jeans, smoothing his palms down over the fabric. They're pretty dirty. He hasn't really gotten around to doing laundry yet.

(They'd agreed to wait a few days after coming back; long, endless days of emails in between constant, necessary naps. Brendon had spent most of yesterday dozing with his laptop on his stomach, trying valiantly to make up his not-inconsiderable sleep debt. The problem was that every time he'd wake up to another email from Spencer, he'd remember what they were talking about and get all restless again. It was a jumpy sort of excitement, the kind that left him unable to sleep once he'd remembered.

He'd played a lot of video games.)

It feels odd to be standing here, waiting for Spencer. He'd insisted on trying this out at Brendon's place, and that was fine with Brendon, but it's definitely something new. There's nothing to distract him; he's not driving, forced to focus on the road. He's just sort of—waiting.

Brendon goes into his kitchen and drinks two glasses of water, one after the other. Then he starts cleaning his kitchen. It's a distraction; it's better than nothing. His kitchen is pretty clean, honestly, but there's takeout boxes to throw away and counters to wipe down and plates to rinse out. It's good enough. Brendon finishes, and then decides to sweep all the floors in his condo. Only the kitchen and the bathroom are actually tiled, but the rest is wood flooring with area rugs. There's enough floor space that it's probably worth sweeping out.

The doorbell rings when he's halfway finished. Brendon answers the door with the broom in his hand, and Spencer quirks an eyebrow at him. "What are you doing?"

"Uh," Brendon says. "Sweeping?"

"Okay," Spencer says.

"I needed a distraction," Brendon says, shrugging. "I'm all excited and shit. I mean—wait, is that lame that I just admitted that out loud?"

"Not really," Spencer says, grinning a little. He leans in and kisses Brendon, just a quick peck on the lips. "It's kind of cute."

"I feel like cute is not the point, here," Brendon says. "But okay."

"Maybe not," Spencer agrees. He seems relaxed. It makes something settle down in Brendon's chest, something nervous and scared that he hadn't even really known was there.

Brendon leads Spencer into the living room. "I'm going to go put this away," Brendon says, holding the broom up. He leaves it in the kitchen hallway and drinks another glass of water from the faucet. Then he takes a deep breath, and walks back down into the living room.

He's ready.

"What's your safeword?" Spencer says, when he walks in. He's sitting on the couch, hands resting on his knees. Brendon sets his glass of water down on the side table.

"Beige," Brendon says. He wipes his hands on his jeans again. It's different this time, in more ways than one. Brendon has a general idea of what's going to happen this time around. It had been a little tricky, because part of the reason he'd loved it so much is that he didn't _know_ what was going to happen. He'd had to just trust Spencer that it was going to turn out okay. But that had been one of Spencer's rules, and Brendon's willing to try. So far, it's not really ruining his excitement. It's almost more exciting when he knows what _might_ happen, but he doesn't know _when._

"Take your clothes off," Spencer says. Brendon swallows. He wants to say, _here?_ but he keeps his mouth shut. Now that they've started, everything is up to Spencer. If he wants Brendon to strip in his living room, he's going to do it. Brendon notices that Spencer's pulled the shades down.

Brendon kicks his shoes off and then his pants, leaving them in a puddle on the floor. He tugs his t-shirt over his head and pulls his socks and underwear off, and he's just about to look over at Spencer to see what happens next when Spencer says, "Don't leave them like that. Fold them up, Brendon. On the couch."

Huh.

Brendon thinks about it for a second, and then reaches down to pick up his t-shirt. It's a little weird, but he trusts Spencer. His brain's moving a mile a minute, and it's hard to focus on making the edges straight. Brendon's actually really good at folding clothes, it's just that he never has a reason to, anymore. He makes a neat stack—jeans on the bottom, t-shirt on top, socks matched and underwear folded into thirds—and when he's done he does feel slightly more focused.

"Good," Spencer says. "Come over here." Brendon walks across the room. Spencer's pushed the coffee table to one side, so there's an empty carpet space in front of him. Brendon thinks about it for a moment, and then he kneels in front of Spencer, his ass resting on his heels. He doesn't think Spencer will mind.

Spencer cocks an eyebrow at him, amused, but he doesn't say anything. He waits. Brendon's still jittery and restless, but he forces himself to keep still. He doesn't look directly at Spencer. He starts counting his breaths, because it helps when he's distracted. One, two. In-and-out-and-In-and-Out. Breathe.

Spencer's hand comes up, and Brendon loses count for a moment. Spencer traces the edges of his collarbones, smoothing his thumbs over the slight jut of bone. He runs his fingers along the side of Brendon's neck, his jaw. It makes Brendon feel strange, fragile and infinitely precious all at once. It's like he's a work of art, or something. Except you usually aren't allowed to touch the works of art, but—oh, whatever.

"Brendon," Spencer says. "Look at me." Brendon tilts his head up. Spencer moves his hand so he's holding Brendon's jaw. He smooths his thumb over the hinge of Brendon's jawbone, and then he digs his fingers in. Brendon swallows reflexively.

"You're so pretty like this," Spencer says, and Brendon can feel his face heating. "Keep your hands behind your back for me. Hold onto your elbows." Brendon hurries to comply. It's not that hard to stay like this, although Brendon suspects that eventually his shoulders will begin to ache.

"Good," Spencer says, and then his hand is in Brendon's hair, and he's _pulling_. Brendon lurches forward, off-balance. He whimpers a little, because it hurts, and Spencer hasn't told him he has to be silent. Spencer holds him there, his fingers digging in. Brendon's just like, _inches_ away from Spencer's dick. He's already half-hard. Spencer's still wearing pants, but Brendon's pretty sure he could get them off with his teeth, if he has to. He pushes forward, shifting his weight as he does so and hoping to disguise it as being off balance. Spencer's fingers tighten in his hair.

"So eager," Spencer says, softly. Then he smiles a little. "Is there something you want?"

"Please," Brendon says, just as quiet. "Please, Spence. I want to. I'll do a good job, I promise, I'll—"

"Hmmm," Spencer says. His other hand comes up, and then his dragging his nails across the thin skin of Brendon's shoulder, over the curve of his neck and up the column of his spine. Brendon gasps a little. Spencer's fingernails aren't long, but they're rough from the drumming, and they catch on his skin. It hurts. Brendon feels his dick jump. "Please," Brendon says, a little more urgently. "Please, I swear, so good, please—" He's so close he can almost taste it, the thick weight of Spencer on his tongue. Spencer looks down at him, and then he pulls him forward, just a little, and Brendon's cheek hits soft denim. He turns his head, biting at the fabric gently. Spencer lets out a tiny noise, a soft sigh. Brendon nuzzles closer, pushing his luck.

Spencer's fingers pull him back again, and Brendon can't help but let out a small noise of disappointment. He knows this is up to Spencer, but he wants it so _bad_. He wants to feel Spencer's hands in his hair, guiding Brendon's mouth up and down the length of his dick. Brendon is impatient.

Spencer reaches down and thumbs the button on his jeans, wriggling them down to his hips. It's not a sexy motion, because he doesn't have much room to move, but Brendon really doesn't give a shit. His dick is like, _right there_. Spencer pulls him back in and Brendon ghosts his mouth over the fabric of his boxers, breathing soft and warm for a moment before taking it into his mouth. Spencer makes another noise.

"Take them off," Spencer says. His voice sound low and thick. "Don't use your hands." Brendon gives one last lick and then he moves upwards, catching the seam of Spencer's boxers in his teeth. He pulls down, and out, but Spencer's dick catches on the fabric and he has to stop what he's doing and try again. On his third try, Spencer's dick finally pops free, and Brendon's leaning in before he's even aware of it. He's only stopped by Spencer's hands in his hair. One of them comes back down to rest on the side of his jaw, so he's cradling Brendon's face. Spencer thumbs at the side of Brendon's mouth, pushing in, and Brendon opens for him. He swirls his tongue around the tip, sucking until Spencer moves it away. His thumb slides over the side of Brendon's face, leaving a wet streak.

"Open up for me," Spencer says, pressing on the hinge of Brendon's jaw, and Brendon opens his mouth. Fuck, he can smell Spencer, and he can almost taste him, and this is _torture_.

"Go slow," Spencer whispers, and then he's guiding Brendon's head to his cock and Brendon moans a little when he's finally close enough to taste. He swirls his tongue around the head, sealing his lips and sucking hard, and then Spencer pulls him back.

" _Slow_ ," Spencer says firmly. "Or we stop. I know you can follow directions, Brendon."

"I'm sorry," Brendon blurts out, without thinking. "Sorry, I'm sorry, please, I'll be good—" It seems to work, because Spencer guides him back in, and Brendon forces himself to slow down. He licks him gently, carefully, teasing his lips across the crown and being careful not to take him more then half-way down. Spencer shifts his hips under Brendon's mouth. Everything he can taste, everything he can smell is Spencer, and Brendon is suddenly, blindingly happy.

"Relax your jaw," Spencer says. "Yeah, like that." Brendon opens his mouth wider, and then Spencer's guiding him in, pushing him down far enough that Brendon can finally swallow him. Brendon keeps his mouth soft, his jaw slack, and Spencer just—slides right in. Brendon can feel his dick leaking onto his stomach.

Spencer fucks his mouth, slow and careful. Sometimes he pulls on Brendon's hair, or runs his nails up the side of Brendon's neck, and then Brendon has to force himself to focus so he doesn't choke on Spencer. He knows Spencer's holding back, but that's okay. They're testing the boundaries this time around. Brendon doesn't mind.

Spencer eventually speeds him up, pulling him back and forth so that it's a quick, smooth slide. Brendon closes his eyes and just feels. He tightens the muscles of his jaw, just a little, and he presses his tongue to the underside of Spencer's dick and Spencer tenses up, pushing forward. Brendon's hard, but he doesn't even care. He just wants to see Spencer come, to feel it in his mouth, and he tightens his lips more, just waiting.

"Fuck," Spencer whispers, and then his hips are jerking under Brendon's mouth, and he starts to come. Brendon tries to swallow—again—but he's still not very good at it. It's not so much the taste as there's a _lot_ of it. Some drips out of the corner of his mouth, no matter how hard he tries. Spencer's still pushing into him, and when he finally pulls back his dick is shiny and wet. Brendon swallows hurriedly, and then leans back in. Spencer stops him, breathing hard.

"Are you going to ask permission?" Spencer says, tightening his hand in Brendon's hair.

Shit.

"I'm sorry," Brendon says quickly, his mouth soft and slow. "I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking. Please let me clean you up. I missed some. I'm sorry, please." Spencer swallows hard, and then allows Brendon to lean back in again. Brendon laps at Spencer's dick, making sure he's got everything. Spencer's starting to go soft, but Brendon doesn't mind. Spencer scratches at the base of Brendon's skull, and Brendon hears himself purring a little, as if from far away. When he's finally done, he sits back on his heels, eyes down.

"Look at me," Spencer says, lifting his chin up. Brendon looks up. Spencer's eyes are dark, and he's flushed. Brendon feels his stomach twist in excitement. "You were so good for me, Brendon. You wanted it so much."

Brendon feels his blush deepen. It's something about how Spencer says it—"You wanted it so much"—something about how his voice curls around the vowels. It leaves Brendon breathless, embarrassed and turned on.

"Stand up," Spencer says, and Brendon raises himself on shaky legs. It's hard with no hands, but he manages it. Spencer zips himself up, and then stands up next to him. Brendon can't help it; he leans into Spencer's chest, breathing hard. He knows he might be breaking the rules, but Spencer just pets at him, brushing his hair away from his sweaty forehead.

"Come on," Spencer says. "Into the bedroom. I think that deserves a reward."

-

"Keep counting," Spencer says calmly. "If you miss one, I'm adding five." He rakes his nails down the skin of Brendon's ass as Brendon chokes out, "Thirty-one." Spencer's using his hand. Brendon's tied up to the headboard, face down, and he's over Spencer's lap and Spencer is—god, he's being merciless, and Brendon can barely think. It hurts so much. It's like he's forgotten how much this _actually hurts_ , when Spencer's whaling on him and he's shying away from the touch, but then as soon as the sting fades, as soon as Spencer pauses for a moment, he wants more.

 _Smack_. "Thirty-two," Brendon mumbles, into the pillow.

"Five more," Spencer says calmly. "I couldn't hear that one very well." Brendon breathes. Spencer pinches just under his ass, timing it so that Brendon's breathing out in a great big whoosh just as the sting registers. Brendon tenses up again, his muscles twitching. Fuck, Spencer is evil.

 _Smack._ "Thirty-three," Brendon says, louder this time. His voice is wrecked. The last time Spencer spanked him, it was almost too quick for him to count the blows; it was just a litany of impacts, _onetwothreefour_ , almost too fast for him to process. This is different. This is Spencer pulling back and hitting him, hard blows that keep jarring him almost off of Spencer's lap. Brendon presses his face into the pillow, and his ass into the air. He feels Spencer's hand move away, and then suddenly it comes back, slippery and wet, and Brendon groans into the pillow. Fuck. That had been the one thing that Spencer had specifically asked permission about, had said very clearly, _I want to do this to you, and I need you to tell me beforehand that it's okay._ Brendon's email response had been delayed, because he'd had to jerk off before he could consider sending a rational reply. Just the thought of it—Spencer's hands on his ass, spreading him open and teasing him, Spencer's hands _inside_ of him—had been enough to leave Brendon breathless. He strains against the rope, pushing back against Spencer's hands.

"Keep counting," Spencer says, and smacks him once, hard, on the left side. "If you get too distracted, I'll stop."

"Please," Brendon moans. "Fuck, fuck, _Spencer_." Some part of him knows he's being utterly shameless, but the rest of his mind is clear. There's no real thoughts, no words, just impulse and emotion and shit, sensation, oh god. Spencer is tracing around his rim and Brendon forces himself to breathe.

"Push back against me," Spencer says, and then his thumb is just brushing his entrance, opening him up. Brendon's face feels hot. He's so exposed like this, and Spencer can see _everything_ , and that's terrifying and exciting all at once.

 _Smack._ "Thirty-four," Brendon chokes out, and then Spencer's slipping his thumb inside him. Brendon clenches down, immediately, and he forces himself to breathe and push back against Spencer. He's done this before, but it's different like this. It's so different when it's not his own fingers.

"You're so tight," Spencer says. "Fuck." Brendon can't help it; he presses down firmly on Spencer's thigh. He just needs—a little bit of pressure, okay, a little bit of something. The endorphins that shoot through him make him dizzy. Spencer slowly slides his thumb out, and then presses it back in. The slide is smooth and easy. Brendon can feel the lube dripping down onto his balls. Spencer's forefinger and middle finger brush over his perineum, and Brendon lets out a whine and bucks into the touch.

"Shhh," Spencer says. "You look so good like this, Brendon. So hot. You want more?" Brendon makes an inarticulate noise in response. He knows it's only Spencer's fingers, but he feels so full. He can't believe that some part of Spencer is actually inside him.

He feels Spencer's hands move away, and then Spencer hits him three times in quick succession.

"Shit," Brendon gasps out. "Thirty-five, Thirty-six, Thirty-seven." Then Spencer's hands are back, holding him open, and Brendon feels Spencer's first finger slide in. There's a second one nudging at his entrance, and Spencer's fingers are so much longer than his thumb, long and smooth and careful, and Brendon presses back against Spencer's hands as much as he can. He can't get much leverage, but fuck. He feels the second one slide in, and then Brendon can hear himself making stupid noises, little _uhn, uh,_ uh's that he has no control over. The stretch burns, and everything hurts and Brendon just wants more.

"Please," Brendon whimpers. "Please, come on, more, just, I need more, anything, anything you want—"

"Anything?" Spencer says, sounding interested, and then he's pressing firmly up against Brendon's prostate. It's like a lightening jolt in his spine; the sensation is so intense that for a moment, Brendon can't actually breathe. He just hangs there, lost in space, and then he's sucking in air and Spencer is pressing in harder, brushing it on every thrust, and Brendon isn't sure he can hold off any longer. He grinds his hips down, but it's not quite enough. There's something missing.

"Spencer," Brendon whines. "Fuck, I need to—I can't. I'm going to, I can't—" He doesn't know what he's asking for. All Brendon knows is that he's so close, hovering just over the edge, but there's something holding him back and it feels like he's going to cry.

"Are you going to come?" Spencer says.

"Yes," Brendon sobs. "Yes, please, I'm going to, I can't help it, I can't—"

"Then come for me," Spencer says, and his voice is dark and fascinated. "It's okay, Brendon, come on—" And then that's it, somehow. It's like the cliff edge falls away and then it's just nothingness, bright sparks of pleasure in a breathless, airless void. Brendon isn't sure he's breathing, and he doesn't care.

He thinks he might have actually blacked out for a few minutes, because when he's aware of things again, Spencer's untying his wrists. Brendon lets them fall limply to the mattress.

He breathes.

"Brendon," Spencer says softly, and then he's pulling him in gently, wrapping Brendon up in his arms. Brendon sore and sticky and Spencer's still fully clothed, but he doesn't have the strength to care.

He lets himself drift, safe in Spencer's arms.

-

Brendon wakes up to Spencer nudging him gently, pushing him to sit up. Brendon flails out a hand, and then Spencer's handing him a glass of water. It's cold. Brendon drinks it down greedily in one go. Spencer takes it from him, after, setting it down on the bedside table.

"Hey," Spencer says softly. "How are you feeling?"

"Good," Brendon mumbles. He's still a little out of it, a little floaty. He curls back into Spencer, seeking warmth. Outside, the sun is setting.

"Just good?" Spencer says, smiling down at him.

"Awesome," Brendon mumbles. "Really awesome." Spencer's got this big stupid smile on his face, like he can't help it. Brendon feels light. He feels breathless and weightless, and suddenly he's laughing. It pours out of his chest and Spencer's smile gets wider.

"Are we good?" Brendon asks, even though he knows the answer. Spencer is so warm around him. He's giddy with it—the high, the knowledge that it worked. The knowledge that he can have Spencer, and still have this.

"We're good," Spencer says. He's laughing, breathless and happy. "I think we're going to be okay."


End file.
